Harolds Club in Reno to be demolished

Tuesday, Dec. 14, 1999 | 11:05 a.m.

RENO -- Harolds Club, a pioneer in Nevada gambling, will come tumbling down in the early morning hours Wednesday on "Casino Row" in downtown Reno.

And in this holiday season, it leaves a little sadness among former employees.

"I drove by and it kind of left a pit in my stomach," says Roy Powers, the former publicist for the casino founded in 1935 by the Smith family. "I always thought there would be a Harolds Club."

But the seven-story building will be imploded by its new owners Harrah's Entertainment Inc. of Las Vegas. It will be converted into a plaza while plans are developed for a new attraction.

The casino and the Smith family will be remembered for bringing many innovations to Nevada gambling.

"They (the Smith family) made Reno gambling," says Dwayne Kling, a former casino worker, turned author.

About 125 former employees and their families gathered for their annual Christmas party Sunday.

"Everybody including myself is sad about this," Kling said.

During World War II, troop trains stopped in Reno and many a serviceman was introduced to legalized gambling.

After the war, the Smith family started the first nationwide advertising campaign for Nevada gambling. Signs sprung up along major highways, proclaiming "Harold's Club Or Bust," or "You May Lose Your Pants But You Will Have a Barrel of Fun, Harold's Club."

At its peak there were 2,200 signs nationally, says Powers, who worked for the casino for 25 years. When men marched off the war, the Smith family became the first casino to hire women dealers. And it was the first to have a female floor boss.

It started a scholarship program for a boy and a girl honor student out of every high school in Nevada to attend the University of Nevada, says Powers.

"But they had to be children who could not afford to go to college," said Powers.

The Smith family spent millions of dollars on these scholarships, he said.

In the late 1950s, its seven bars sold more liquor than any other hotel or business in the nation.

Powers said founder Raymond I. "Pappy" Smith never approved of drinking. But when he saw the profit that could be made, he agreed to install bars in the casino, which started as a one-room club.

Smith and his sons Harold and Raymond formerly worked in the carnivals in California before moving to Nevada in 1935 and opening the one-room casino, which grew over the years.

"They were characters and mavericks but they were great people," said Powers.

Harold would occasionally ride his white stallion through the main floor of the club, despite a swarm of gamblers. On some slow nights, he opened the bar for free drinks for an hour. That would attract some of the downtrodden from the adjacent Douglas Alley, who would be sitting at the bar drinking champagne.

"Pappy" would go through the casino at times, doubling the bets of gamblers at the tables. And he would pass out candy bars to the patrons.

Harolds Club was thriving while the Las Vegas Strip was growing up.

"It wasn't just a place to work, it was home to a lot of people," says Kling, who started as a change boy and worked his way up to a floor boss.

Kling, now an author who has written about Reno and its gambling, said "The Smith family was so accessible. It was complete night and day to Bill Harrah," referring to the chief rival of Harold's Club.

"People didn't mind going to work," Kling said. "The key words were 'Fun and Family."'

The Smiths posted signs in the casino that customers should not gamble more than they could afford to lose. And if a player went overboard, he or she often got bus or train fare back to their home, courtesy of the owners.

The casino was sold in June 1970 to Howard Hughes, who dropped the apostrophe from the name. "It went down hill then," said Powers. Winnings from Harolds, he said, were siphoned off to help the other Hughes casinos in Las Vegas.

In June 1988 Lincoln Management Group, which operated the Fitzgeralds casinos, purchased Harolds Club, which had fallen on hard times. And it was closed on March 31, 1995, says Kling. Harrah's purchased it in June this year.

At 2 a.m. Wednesday, Controlled Demolition Inc., of Phoenix Md., will touch off the explosion that will take down the seven-story structure

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