The Mob Museum

A while back, Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman announced plans to build a $50 million “Mob Museum” (no, not the Hendon Mob) in the downtown area in order to give recognition and acknowledgment to all the mob guys who jump-started modern-day Sin City. (You got a problem with that?)

He obviously got the idea from me, because way back in 1992, I wrote a column urging that Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, the guy who started it all, should finally be given credit and honored. My suggestion was to erect a welcoming statue of Bugsy towering across the Strip, one leg on each side. It would be the size of the Colossus of Rhodes or the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. To give it more authenticity, the statue would be riddled with bullet holes. Bugsy would be extending one hand holding a pair of dice, and pointing a tommy gun with the other.

As I pointed out back then, Vegas shouldn’t be ashamed of its roots just because the founding fathers might have been forced to bump off a few people in the line of work. After all, with the passage of time, people who were once castigated as criminals become more fondly remembered as merely colorful rogues. Pirates, highwaymen, smugglers, cattle rustlers — they’ve now been softened by history and enshrined in local folklore. Australians, for example, take perverse pride in the fact that their country was originally a penal colony for convicts. Inhabitants of the Pitcairn Islands don’t seem to mind that they’re descended from mutineers of the British ship Bounty. And does Siberia have a bad rap just because Joseph Stalin sent half the citizens of Russia there for punishment? Oh, it does? Well, let’s not nitpick.

The Mob Museum, officially to be called the Las Vegas Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, will charge admission (an entrance fee, not an extortion fee), and will feature a wide range of photos, artifacts, and exhibits of mob life, many procured from the children and grandchildren of top Mafia bosses and soldiers, along with information about the FBI and law enforcement departments that fought the mobsters. The city expects it to be a big moneymaker, attracting 500,000 to 800,000 visitors a year. (Ya better go, or else, buddy.)

Mayor Goodman, of course, is a former mob attorney who during his career represented some of the leading reputed organized-crime figures in Las Vegas, including Meyer Lansky, Nicky Scarfo, Herbert “Fat Herbie” Blitzstein, former Stardust Casino boss Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal, and Jamiel “Jimmy” Chagra. His most notorious client, however, was Chicago mobster Anthony “Tony the Ant” Spilotro, who was the inspiration for the short-tempered killer in the 1995 movie Casino, played by Joe Pesci.

Spilotro, whose “hits” in Chicago reportedly included squeezing some guy’s head in a vise, later moved to Vegas, where his primary task was to control casino employees and other personnel involved in skimming and embezzlement. He eventually ran afoul of the mob and ended up being beaten with a baseball bat and dumped into a shallow grave in Indiana.

Anyway, when I heard about the museum, I called Goodman’s office and made an appointment to see him. “I’m Max Shapiro, the famous poker humorist,” I introduced myself. “I have some wonderful ideas for your museum.”

“You talkin’ to me?” he responded. (I guess he’s really into this mob thing.) But after I explained how I came up with a mob appreciation idea years ago, he thanked me and asked what suggestions I had.

“Well,” I said, “you really need more than just photos, documents, and such. You want to liven it up with some interactive devices. How about putting in a shooting gallery machine like they have in penny arcades, where you fire at a bear or other moving target? Here, the target would be a gangster.”

Goodman shrugged. “That doesn’t sound very original or exciting.”

“It would be if you had the mob guy shooting back.”

Goodman shuddered and said that he would take my suggestion under advisement. “Any other ideas?”

For added color and authenticity, I advised him to put in several blackjack tables. “Then, when a visitor calls out, ‘Hit me with a blackjack,’ he’ll get hit over the head with one.”

For some reason, Goodman didn’t think that was such a good idea, either. Not giving up, I next suggested that they put in some poker tables.

“Poker games have nothing to do with the mob,” Goodman said.

“They do if they’re played with a kill.”

Goodman’s patience was wearing thin. “Well, thanks anyway, Max,” he said as he wearily led me to the door. “I guess maybe we’ll just stick with our original plans.”

“Wait, wait,” I called out. “How about playing a game in there? You know, Mafia Wars.”

“Goodbye, Max; thanks for all your help,” Goodman barked as he shoved me out the door.

As I was researching and writing all of this, I discovered that another group of people were planning to challenge Goodman by creating their own mob museum, which would be an exhibit housed in one of the casinos on the Strip. They reasoned, who would then bother to go downtown? Talk about real Mafia Wars!

I thought about all of this and then came up with my best idea yet. It would combine my original concept with Goodman’s. Just build a statue of Bugsy, the size of the Statue of Liberty, hollow it out the same way, put the memorabilia inside, and charge admission. That way, you’d have the best of both worlds — or the worst, depending on your view of mob life.

Oh well, when you think about it, who really cares about nostalgia and what mob guys did in casinos back in the last century? After all, anyone wanting to see what it’s like to be in a casino run by a gangster can experience all of that scary stuff currently, and in the flesh.

Just stop by Big Denny’s Barstow Card Casino.

Max Shapiro, a lifelong poker player and former newspaper reporter with several writing awards to his credit, has been writing a humor column for Card Player ever since it was launched 20 years ago. His early columns were collected in his book, Read ’em and Laugh.