Siegel was killed in the Beverly Hills home of his girlfriend in June. While it became more successful, the mobsters who had poured money into Siegel’s project were not happy about its budget problems and suspected that Siegel was skimming money. The Flamingo quickly shut down, reopening on March 1 the next year. Locals tended to prefer the cheaper casinos in downtown Las Vegas to those on the Strip. The opening was generally considered a disaster, however, after a storm grounded VIPs from Hollywood in California and gamblers who didn’t have rooms at the unfinished hotel took their winnings and left. Its high-end clientele would be served by staff wearing tuxedos. The Flamingo was to be a new kind of luxury for Vegas, a full resort that featured a nine-hole golf course tennis, squash and handball courts a trapshooting range and extensive landscaping. Mobster Bugsy Siegel and his partners opened the hotel with just 105 rooms, hoping the grand event would attract business that would recoup cost overruns and help finance the rest of construction.
26, 1946, despite the fact that it wasn’t yet complete. The Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas – an icon for tourists traveling to the Strip – opened on Dec.
