Hoover Dam Lodge | |
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Location | Boulder City, Nevada, U.S. |
Address | U.S. Route 93 |
Opening date | May 1958 |
Theme | Rustic lodge |
Number of rooms | 372 |
Total gaming space | 20,782 sq ft (1,930.7 m2) |
Owner | Nevada Restaurant Services |
Previous names | Gold Strike (1958–1998) Hacienda Hotel and Casino (1999–2015) |
Coordinates | 36°00′36″N 114°47′05″W / 36.00998°N 114.78486°WCoordinates: 36°00′36″N 114°47′05″W / 36.00998°N 114.78486°W |
Website | hooverdamlodge |
Hoover Dam Lodge is a hotel and casino near Boulder City, Nevada. It is owned and operated by Nevada Restaurant Services. It was previously the Gold Strike until it was largely destroyed by an accidental fire on June 16, 1998. It reopened the next year as Hacienda Hotel & Casino, and then took on its current name in January 2015.
The hotel is located on a parcel of private land surrounded by Lake Mead National Recreation Area, three miles from Hoover Dam. It overlooks Lake Mead and has a 17-story tower with 372 rooms.
The 20,782 square feet (1,930.7 m2) casino has 154 slot machines, and a race and sports book operated by William Hill.
The property was originally a patented mining claim owned by Las Vegas real estate developer Patrick Sullivan, who was seeking gold and turquoise. It became known as Sullivan's Gulch. In the 1920s, the Bureau of Reclamation withdrew over a million acres of land for the creation of Hoover Dam and Lake Mead, but overlooked Sullivan's land. The National Park Service (NPS) made attempts to buy the land as early as 1936.
In 1954, Sullivan's heirs sold the property for $20,000 to Boulder City businessman Don Belding, his business partner, O. L. Raney, and Jack Richardson. They saw an opportunity to service drivers going to and from the dam, and little competition because Boulder City prohibited gambling. They opened the Gold Strike Inn in May 1958 with a snack bar, gift shop, cocktail lounge, service station, and six slot machines.
In the 1960s, the partners leased the site to a developer that hoped to expand it as an Old West theme park. The name was changed to Fort Lucinda and attractions such as llama rides, a wax museum, and a 3 ft (914 mm) narrow gauge railroad were added. A "ghost town" consisting of buildings from various northern Nevada towns was moved to the property from the New Frontier casino. The project was killed by financing and water supply problems, control reverted to Belding, Raney, and Richardson, and the Gold Strike name returned.