CBS News
How Las Vegas, once known as “Sin City,” became an unlikely sports haven
Ten years ago, the idea of Las Vegas having a professional football team was unthinkable. Now, the city is home to three franchises and is hosting the Super Bowl for the first time.
What changed to make Sin City one of the biggest sports havens in the country?
For over a century, Las Vegas has been a city of reinvention, according to Michael Green, a University of Nevada, Las Vegas, history professor. As early as the 1850s, people worried that the city had a reputation because of the presence of settlers from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, who believed in polygamy. In 1905, a railroad connected Los Angeles to Salt Lake City and laid the groundwork for what would be Las Vegas’ destiny, as it became a railroad town that operated 24 hours a day. In 1931, gambling became legal in the city, and almost immediately, casinos began to pop up, setting the stage for decades to come.
As time wore on, the city only expanded, with bigger casinos being built, a highway connecting Las Vegas to Los Angeles, and businesses becoming producers for war materials. People came “in droves to work in the plants,” Green explained, and with this boom came organized crime interests that had been chased out of other cities. Soon came a post-war economic boom and jet travel that brought tourists to town, and Vegas’ transformation into Sin City was complete.
/ Getty Images
“You have these celebrities like Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Jerry Lewis,” Green said. “All these people coming here. And there was a saying that Las Vegas is where you went to be certified an adult.”
It was that tourist boom that brought college sweethearts Carolyn and Oscar Goodman to Vegas from the East Coast. As an attorney in the Philadelphia district attorney’s office, Oscar Goodman knew there was an opportunity out west, and in 1964, the pair made the move.
“It was a small, nice town,” Oscar Goodman said. He opened a legal practice that would soon take off and even played himself in the 1995 movie “Casino.” In 1999, he parlayed his fame into an unlikely run for mayor. He won nearly two-thirds of the vote.
As mayor, Oscar Goodman doubled down on his flamboyant public image and focused on cleaning up and reviving the city’s downtown, expanding on the efforts of the previous decade’s building boom, which had created the modern Las Vegas strip. He also focused on building civic and cultural institutions, including state-of-the-art hospitals and a performing arts center.
It wasn’t just entertainment acts that Oscar Goodman wanted, though. As mayor, he began the process of luring professional sports teams to Las Vegas. However, not everyone was on board, and former National Basketball Association Commissioner David Stern proved an especially tough sell.
“He said ‘Over my dead body,'” Oscar Goodman recalled. “He believed that Las Vegas, or any place that had live sports betting, should not have an NBA franchise there.”
Oscar Goodman served as mayor for 12 years. When he stepped down, the city elected who he calls “the most beautiful mayor in the history of mayors” — his wife.
Carolyn Goodman won 60% of the vote in a runoff election and took office in 2011. Under her leadership, Las Vegas finally landed pro sports, with a National Hockey League expansion team. It’s an achievement that means a lot to residents, Carolyn Goodman said. The Golden Knights‘ first home game was just days after the 2017 mass shooting at a music festival killed 60 and injured hundreds.
“You cannot even ask the question without thinking of one October when we had that horrific slaughter of innocent people,” Carolyn Goodman said. “They became our community. They helped everybody begin the process of learning to know they had to accept that that horrific problem happened, and that forever solidified how a sports team could be involved.”
Now, the city is a venerable sports mecca. In addition to the Golden Knights, it’s home to two-time WNBA champions the Las Vegas Aces and the National Football League’s Las Vegas Raiders. Super Bowl LVIII will be played at the Raiders’ home stadium.
“It’s the center of the universe now. It really is,” Oscar Goodman said. “People come from all over. In the beginning, they were limited to the gambling because where they came from did not have gambling. Now they come here for the shopping, and the food is outstanding, you can’t get a bad meal here, with the best entertainment in the world.
“… As long as we have smart people here, creative people, we’ll always be ahead of everybody else because we’ve set such a high standard for ourselves. That, I believe, is the reason for our success.”
BALTIMORE — One person was killed and nine others injured in a shooting and fiery crash in the Baltimore suburb of Towson Tuesday night, authorities said.
Law enforcement responded at around 7:15 p.m. in the 8500 block of Loch Raven Boulevard, Baltimore County Police Chief Robert McCullough said in a news briefing.
“It appears to be a mass shooting incident,” McCullough told reporters. “We have multiple persons who were shot. Right now, we are determining the circumstances and the conditions in this case.”
The first arriving officer found a vehicle on its side in flames near a funeral home, McCullough said, and then several gunshot victims were found in the area.
“There appears to be some type of incident that led to the vehicle crashing and catching on fire,” McCollough said. “Investigators are looking into the circumstances leading up to that.”
The name of the person killed and the manner of death was not released, nor were the conditions of the nine people injured. McCollough did not specify how many of the nine people injured were gunshot victims.
At this time, investigators believe this was an isolated and targeted incident, with no further threat to the community, he added. It’s unclear if any suspects have been arrested. There was no word on a possible motive.
“We will leave no stone unturned and we will dedicate every resource to this,” McCullough said. “We don’t generally see incidents like this in our community in Baltimore County. I assure you as your police chief that we will put all resources toward trying to clear this case.”
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was at the scene assisting police, as was the Baltimore County Fire Department.
“This is an incident that is shocking, particularly for those of us in Baltimore County,” said Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski. “These types of incidents are unheard of here, so it really shocks the conscience. However, we want our residents to know that we are, as always, fully committed to ensuring that both our fire and police departments have the full support and all the resources they need from the Baltimore County government to ensure that they bring this investigation to a conclusion.”
Anyone with information is asked to call Baltimore County Police at 410-887-4636.
President-elect Donald Trump announced he will nominate Herschel Walker, the former football player whose 2022 Senate run was plagued by controversy, to serve as U.S. ambassador to the Bahamas.
“Herschel has spent decades serving as an Ambassador to our Nation’s youth, our men and women in the Military, and athletes at home and abroad,” Trump said on social media Tuesday night.
Walker would need to be confirmed by the Senate to assume the role. The Senate has not confirmed a U.S. ambassador to the Bahamas in over a decade. Former President Barack Obama had nominated Cassandra Butts for the role in 2014, but the Senate never even brought her nomination up for a vote, according to The Associated Press. She died in 2016.
Trump in his first term nominated Doug Manchester in 2017 for the ambassador role, but his nomination stalled for over two years. CBS News in 2019 also uncovered evidence of a possible pay-to-play scheme for the role. He eventually withdrew and Trump went on to nominate William Douglass in 2020. Douglass’ nomination was withdrawn by President Biden when he took office, and Mr. Biden in turn nominated Calvin Smyre, who has not been confirmed by the Senate.
Absent an official ambassador to the Bahamas, Kimberly Furnish currently serves in the role of Chargé d’Affaires.
Walker rose to national prominence as a star running back for the Georgia Bulldogs, winning the Heisman trophy in 1982. He spent his first few years of professional ball in the United States Football League before it folded, and then moved on to the NFL.
Walker reentered the national spotlight when, at Trump’s urging, he challenged Georgia’s Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock for his seat in 2022. The race featured several controversies, including two women claiming that Walker — who was running as an anti-abortion candidate — had paid for them to get abortions.
Walker denied both allegations.
In one instance, Walker admitted to writing a check for a woman who said he paid for her to get an abortion in 2009, but he said he hadn’t known what the money was for.
Another woman claimed Walker paid her to get an abortion while the two carried out a six-year relationship while he was married to another woman and playing in the NFL. During a news conference back in 2022, she said she couldn’t go through with the procedure when she went to get it herself, so Walker took her to a clinic in the Dallas area the next day and waited for her while she got the abortion.
“This was a lie a week ago and it is a lie today,” Walker said at the time following an interview the woman gave a week after the initial news conference.
Warnock would go on to win the election in a runoff after neither candidate received more than 50% of the vote on election day.
Aaron Navarro and
contributed to this report.
BALTIMORE — One person was killed and nine others injured in a mass shooting in the Baltimore suburb of Towson Tuesday night, authorities said.
Law enforcement responded at around 7:15 p.m. in the 8500 block of Loch Raven Boulevard, Baltimore County Police Chief Robert McCullough said in a news briefing.
“It appears to be a mass shooting incident,” Baltimore County Police Chief Robert McCullough told reporters. “We have multiple persons who were shot. Right now, we are determining the circumstances and the conditions in this case.”
The first arriving officer found a vehicle on its side in flames, McCullough said, and then several gunshot victims were found in the area. The name of the person killed was not released, and the conditions of the nine people injured was unknown.
At this time, investigators believe this was an isolated and targeted incident, with no further threat to community at this point, he added. It’s unclear if any suspects have been arrested.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is at the scene assisting police, as was the Baltimore County Fire Department.
Anyone with information is asked to call Baltimore County Police at 410-887-4636.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
