Origins
Las Vegas is undoubtedly one of the stranger places in the USA. Its sheer scale, the juxtaposition of replicas of famous landmarks, the relentless 24 hour gambling and the fantasy element of the place all contribute to that strangeness. It is also hard for me to get over it’s origins, summarised here by history.com:
A desert metropolis built on gambling, vice and other forms of entertainment…the city was founded by ranchers and railroad workers but quickly found that its greatest asset was not its springs but its casinos. Las Vegas’s embrace of Old West-style freedoms—gambling and prostitution—provided a perfect home for East Coast organized crime. Beginning in the 1940s, money from drugs and racketeering built casinos and was laundered within them. Visitors came to partake in what the casinos offered: low-cost luxury and the thrill of fantasies fulfilled.
The chain of events that led to Mafia involvement in the development of the city is straightforward enough. The state of Nevada legalized gambling in 1931, but no one paid attention until after World War II, when the Mafia, in the form of Meyer Lansky and Bugsy Siegel, saw business potential. Siegel opened the showcase 105 room Flamingo Hotel and Casino in December 1946 and whilst he paid the ultimate price for skimming from Mafia operations the Flamingo was successful under Lansky and other crime families moved in. Properties such as the 1,000 room Stardust, the Desert Inn, and the Riviera followed. In 1959 the Revolution in Cuba removed President Batista, who had been in league with Lansky, and with him the gambling concessions he had made to the mafia. It also made Havana a no go destination for many high rollers who re-routed to Las Vegas, accelerating its development. Today a significant proportion of the largest hotels in the world are on situated the Strip.
Downtown
Downtown Las Vegas, the original site of the town and gambling district of Las Vegas, centres on Fremont Street. It has had significant investment of late but still appears to be the poor relation to The Strip, or offers a more vintage experience, depending on your perspective. On one trip I had breakfast with a fellow photographer before heading out to Fremont Street and we discussed our approaches to photography. Fred is an out-and-out street photographer; his interest is in people, pure and simple and he has a practised technique to get in close and yet not be noticed. I work differently as I am very interested in the relationship between the background and people in the frame. I suppose that makes me more of a travel photographer; I want to capture something of the spirit of place wherever I am at the time. In the shot here I wanted to combine the large ‘Gambling’ sign with the women dressed as show girls. For this shot I used a circular polariser, which required an ISO setting of 2,500 for f8, but the boost in contrast was worth it. The noise the Leica Q produces is relatively filmic and if it appears excessive I apply Topaz DeNoise. The other shots from my various trips to the desert metropolis are in the Las Vegas gallery.