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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.
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“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.”
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Floods, landslides struck parts of Bosnia as residents slept, leaving at least 16 dead and several missing
A severe rainstorm struck Bosnia overnight Friday, killing at least 16 people in floods and landslides in several towns and villages in central and southern parts of the country, with surging waters rushing into people’s homes as they were sleeping.
Rescue services in the south said several people were missing and called on volunteers and the army to assist as roads were closed and houses left without electricity.
Josip Kalem, a resident of Fojnica, one of the towns hit by the floods, said his dog’s barking woke him up at around 4 a.m. When he came out on the terrace, he saw the water rising rapidly.
“I came down, woke up my wife, and we looked around, we could not get out of the house. We saw more and more water coming in,” he said. “All of a sudden, the water was flooding the garage, basement, my car — everything. The water swept it all away, including my dog. Flood took it downstream.”
Andja Milesic, another resident of Fojnica, also said she was caught by surprise in the middle of the night.
“When I woke up, my bedroom floor was already soaked. I walked into the hallway — water was everywhere — the living room, everywhere,” she said. “It was horrible.”
Armin Durgut / AP
Darko Juka, a spokesman for the local administration, said at least 14 people had died in and around the southern town of Jablanica. Officials later said two more bodies have been found.
“Those are the ones who have been discovered by rescuers,” he said. “We still don’t know the final death toll.”
“I don’t remember such a crisis since the war,” Juka said referring to the 1992-95 war in Bosnia that left the country in ruins. “The scale of this chaotic situation is harrowing.”
Defense Minister Zukan Helez told N1 regional television that troops have been engaged to help and that the casualties were reported.
Helez said that “hour after hour we are receiving news about new victims. … Our first priority is to save the people who are alive and buried in houses where the landslides are.”
A pregnant woman lost her baby after she was rescued from the floods and transferred to a hospital in the regional center of Mostar. Authorities said doctors were fighting for her life as well. Separately, a child was successfully rescued and hospitalized, local officials said.
Rescue services in the towns of Jablanica and Kiseljak said the power was off overnight and mobile phones lost their signal.
The Jablanica fire station said that the town was completely inaccessible because roads and trainlines were closed.
“The police informed us that the railroad is also blocked,” the state rescue service said in a statement. “You can’t get in or out of Jablanica at the moment. Landline phones are working, but mobile phones have no signal.”
It urged people not to venture out on the flooded streets.
Human-caused climate change increases the intensity of rainfall because warm air holds more moisture. This summer, the Balkans were also hit by long-lasting record temperatures, causing a drought. Scientists said the dried-out land has hampered the absorption of floodwaters.
Armin Durgut / AP
Drone footage broadcast on Bosnian media showed villages and towns completely submerged under water, while videos on social networks showed dramatic scenes of muddy torrents and damaged roads.
One of the busiest roads linking Sarajevo with the Adriatic coast via Jablanica was swept into a river, together with a railway line in a huge landslide, according to photos.
“Many people are endangered because of big waters and landslides. There is information about victims and many injured and missing persons,” said the civic protection service.
Authorities urged people to stay on the upper floors of their homes. Reports said surging waters swept away domestic animals and cars as the water swiftly filled up lower floors of buildings.
The heavy rains and strong winds were also reported in neighboring Croatia, where several roads were closed and the capital of Zagreb prepared for the swollen Sava River to burst its banks.
Heavy winds have hampered traffic along the southern coast of the Adriatic Sea, and flash floods caused by heavy rain threatened several towns and villages in Croatia.
Floods caused by torrential rains were also reported in Montenegro, south of Bosnia, where some villages were cut off and roads and homes flooded.
In 2014, floodwaters triggered more than 3,000 landslides across the Balkans, laying waste to entire towns and villages and disturbing land mines leftover from the region’s 1990s war, along with warning signs that marked the unexploded weapons.
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Floods, landslides struck parts of Bosnia as residents slept, leaving at least 16 dead and several missing
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Eye Opener: At least 70 people killed in gang attack in Haiti, United Nations says
Floods, landslides struck parts of Bosnia as residents slept, leaving at least 16 dead and several missing