Buckley’s Jackpot Club, Las Vegas, Version 2, Triblend Tee

Venue History

Located at 20 Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas, Buckley’s Jackpot Club opened in 1952 and operated until about 1960. Tucked into the “Glitter Gulch” strip of Fremont, the club epitomized the smaller-scale, slots-only joints that once filled the downtown gaming corridor and catered to the everyday gambler rather than high-rollers. The club’s promotional copy was bold for its era. One matchbook tagline read: “Where everyone can win a jackpot” and “So simple ANY 3 of a kind wins a jackpot.” This marketing reflects a time when slot machines were a major draw and the promise of an easy win was a powerful lure. Its business model appears to have been primarily—or entirely—slots driven, rather than full table-game operations. The venue filled a key niche: a modest, approachable casino for locals and visitors alike in an era when downtown Las Vegas was still central to the city’s gaming economy. The surrounding block at 20–32 Fremont changed hands many times, hosting many iterations of slots joints, novelty-themed clubs, girlie joints and the like. Despite its promising positioning, Buckley’s Jackpot Club closed around 1960. After its closure, the space was taken over by Starlite Sales and later other businesses such as Mecca Slots and the Golden Goose. Its relatively short lifespan underscores the rapid turnover and evolving consumer preferences of downtown Las Vegas in the 1950s and 1960s—the small slot-joints gave way to larger resorts, more polished venues, and eventually the mega-casinos of the Strip. While the physical Buckley’s Jackpot Club building was long ago subsumed by subsequent redevelopment, the legacy of the club remains a slice of Las Vegas history: a reminder of the era when Fremont Street’s neon canyon was built on dozens of compact, independently operated casinos offering hope and quick wins. Its story is part of the broader narrative of downtown Las Vegas—its rise, reinvention, and eventual transformation. Today the property is a part of Circa Resort and Casino, owned by Derek and Greg Stevens, who also own Golden Gate Hotel and Casino and The D Hotel and Casino.