1955 was an interesting year for the Las Vegas Strip.  Three resorts opened, the Royal Nevada and the Riviera opened within a day of one another and the Dunes would open a month later.  All three would struggle financially, with the Royal Nevada ultimately closing for good while the other two would find their financial footing.

 

The Nevada Tax Commission (precursor to the Nevada Gaming Commission) in March, 1955 issued licenses to David, Lou and Meyer Gensburg, Jack Goldman, RH Bailey, Murray Saul, Arthur Marx and Gummo Marx. 

 

The Riviera created a stir before her doors ever opened.  The hotel was to be a departure from the low-rise, two story garden style motel rooms that had been popular since the early days of the 1940s.  The Riviera was going vertical, nine stories into the air, the first high-rise on the famed boulevard.  With a price tag of $10 million, the hotel would have 291 rooms.  According to Alan Hess, there was some question around town as to whether the desert soil would even support such a structure.

 

Roy France and Son was hired to design the innovative hotel. France envisioned a utilizing design elements of his streamlined Sands Hotel that had been built in 1939 down in Miami, Florida.  Working with the firm was local architect, J. Maher Weller.  The construction was done by Taylor Construction Company who would build three other resorts over the years, the Tropicana, the International and the original MGM Grand Hotel.

 

A block with banks of horizontal strip windows marked the center of the tower.  Wrap-around windows delineating the corners were added.  The contrasting elevator tower, with decorative gold buttons, definitely conjured up images of South Beach instead of the Southwest.  The various floors were named after French resort cities such as Cannes, Monaco and Nice.  The 9th floor were penthouse suites and housed a health club.

 

The pylon sign "skewered the thin porte-cochere like a toothpick through a cheese canapé" according to Alan Hess.  There was a second V-shaped marquee sign at the roadside entrance.

 

 

 

The interiors recalled the famed Fountainbleau.  The lobby and front desk area featured Italian marble and corrugated cooper fixtures.  The Starlight Lounge, just off the lobby, had a 150-foot free-form stage bar.  The lighting fixtures were brass in a starburst design against a teal-blue sky canopy.  The Treniers opened the Starlight Lounge.  With their rollicking rock and roll and good-natured humor, the group kept the lounge jumping til the early hours of the morning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Hickory Room Restaurant was Western style, paneled throughout in wormwood.  Open hickory fires and a hugh rotisserie were in view of the diners.

 

The Coffee Shop (which later became Cafe Noir) was actually two restaurants with one section designed for swimmers.

 

There was a pool side dining terrace called Le Bistro, that was shaded, in part, by numerous redwood trees imported from California. 

 

The Riviera opened its doors on April 20th, 1955.  By most accounts, it was a lavish affair.  Liberace and his brother, George were the headliners.  Actress Joan Crawford was the official hostess.  She reportedly received $10,000 for four days of greeting guests.  Other perks included a free room and meals.

 

The hiring of Liberace seriously upped the ante on what it cost to put on a show in Las Vegas.  Liberace was receiving a record-breaking $50,000 a week.  Liberace had been playing the New Frontier for $750 a week.  At the Riviera, he would be accompanied by a 32 piece orchestra conducted by his brother, George.   George often told the story of how he and Lee had met Jack Goldman (one of the original owners) on a plane trip to Florida.  Goldman explained that he was building the tallest resort in Las Vegas and needed a headliner.  Having heard many a visionary, Liberace explained that they were very loyal to the Frontier.  Goldman then made his lavish offer.  The Liberace brothers bolted the New Frontier.

 

Christan Dior designed Liberace's dazzling white tuxedo that he wore on opening night. 

 

The Clover Room was the showroom.  It held 532 for the dinner show and 700 for the second show.  It had six separate elevations and a 40 x 80 foot stage which was the first to use four revolving turntables.  At 10,000 square feet it was the largest showroom on the Strip and would be utilized to the max by the Riviera's top headliner, Liberace.  The room was draped in platinum gray velour.  The jet black ceiling was illuminated by starlit constellations.

 

The hotel's construction went down to the wire with the resort opening while the paint was still drying.  Over half of the musicians for the orchestra came from Los Angeles because there weren't enough players in town.

 

The Riviera seemed to open at the right time with the Desert Inn's Tournament of Champions underway, another detonation at the Nevada Test Site occurring and a light heavyweight boxing match between champion  Archie Moore and contender Nino Valdez.

 

Journalists and reporters from around the world covered the opening.   But it wasn't enough to keep the hotel from running in the red.  The Miami oriented operators were unaccustomed to gambling and the hotel slid towards bankruptcy.  The Gensburg brothers began quickly looking for new operators to run the hotel.

 

They quickly hired Gus Greenbaum, Ben Goffstein, Harry S. Goldman, Ross Miller (father of future governor, Bob Miller), Davey Berman, Jess Goldman, Charles Harrison and Frank, Fred and Elias Atol to take over the sinking resort and and fix the problems.  Greenbaum and Berman had been associated with the fabulous Flamingo and had been part of the group that took control of that hotel in the wake of Bugsy Siegel's murder in Beverly Hills. 

 

Greenbaum had retired to Scottsdale but his "bosses" in Chicago wanted him to return to Las Vegas and work his magic once again.  According to Steve Fischer (author of When the Mob Ran Vegas) Greenbaum was told "Vegas is where you belong."  Greenbaum fought the decision to move back to Las Vegas.  Then, his sister-in-law, Lenore, was found dead in her bed, murdered.  Greenbaum and his wife, Bess, packed the car and returned to Las Vegas.

 

The new operators attracted some unwanted attention.  By June, the Nevada Tax Commission wanted a complete probe of the hotel.  Commissioner Paul McDermitt was quoted, "I want to find out who the financial backers are, who is in the background and who is in the pit."

 

On July 28th, Greenbaum applied to the Nevada Tax Commission to become the managing director of the Riviera.  In his application, Greenbaum stated that he had a previous good reputation with the Flamingo and he would be hiring some of those same people to join him at the Riviera.  Greenbaum also stated that he and his group had loaned the Riviera $500,000 to continue operating.  

 

On Sept. 28th, the Tax Commission agreed to lease the casino at the Riviera to Greenbaum and his partners.  The Commission noted that the staggering debt of the hotel and the pressure of creditors were the main factors in their decision.  Out of the 14 applicants, only 8 were approved.  Greenbaum, Goffstein and Berman were back in business.

 

The new operators began to right the listing ship that had been the Riviera.  They cleaned house, stopped the pilfering and soon the hotel was making a profit. 

 

Liberace was still the top headliner.  Other top acts that played the Riv in the 1950s, Orson Welles and his magic act (When questioned by local columnist, Forrest Duke, if his act was a secret, Welles replied in his rich baritone "It isn't a secret but it's a mystery to me.") , Ken Murray's Blackouts with Marie Wilson, Dinah Shore and  George White's Scandals.  Elvis Presley, performing at the New Frontier, caught Liberace's act one evening.  Liberace invited Elvis on stage and the two traded places, Liberace on guitar and Elvis at Lee's grand piano.

 

 

 

 

The Nite of Stars, a yearly fund-raiser for St. Jude's Ranch for Children, was held at the Riviera in 1958.  Bob Hope, who never headlined in Las Vegas, Lucille Ball and other top acts performed from the stage of the Clover Room to an overflow crowd that had paid $100 a person to attend.

 

While the Riviera was finally financial stable, Gus Greenbaum's life was spinning out of control.  According to Steve Fischer, Greenbaum's Chicago "friends" were becoming increasingly unhappy with his out-of-control lifestyle.  Greenbaum's friend, gangster and union thug Willie Bioff, was killed when he was blown up along with his car outside a home in Phoenix.  The death seemed to send Greenbaum further spiraling down.  His partner, Davey Berman, took ill and the prognosis was cancer.  Berman died a short while later.  Bess Greenbaum, never liking the Las Vegas life-style of her husband, returned to Phoenix in the fall of 1958.  Greenbaum, drinking too much and said to have a heroin problem, decided to spend the Thanksgiving holiday that year with his family.   On the morning of Dec. 3rd, the housekeeper found Mr. and Mrs. Gus Greenbaum dead.  Bess Greenbaum's body was found in the living room.  Greenbaum's was found in the bedroom.   Their throats had been slashed.  The murderer was never found.

 

A memorial service was held for the Greenbaums at Temple Beth Shalom on Dec. 5th.  Rabbi Bernard Cohen and Cantor Herman Kinnory presided over the service.  In the audience were local dignitaries, journalists and top executives from the Riviera.   The corner ruled the deaths murder.  Vice-President of the Riviera, Ben Goffstein, announced a $25,000 reward for information leading to the capture of the killer(s).  There were rumors flying around about the reason for the Greenbaum killings but an investigator for the Nevada Tax Commission found no link between Nevada gambling and the deaths.

 

By 1959, the Riviera was starting to remodel some of its interiors.  The Starlight Lounge got a make-over that separated it further from the gambling.  Bernard of Hollywood, one of the premiere portrait artists in Hollywood, opened a studio in the hotel. 

 

Ben Goffstein was elevated to President of the Riviera, given a watch for his excellent service to the hotel and promptly checked into a local hospital where he was diagnosed with physical exhaustion and told to take it easy.

 

By October, the remodeling was kicked up a notch.  It was announced that the hotel would undergo a $3.5 million expansion which would add 114 rooms to the resort as well as a Sky Room on the 10th floor.  The Sky Room would feature dusk to dawn dancing.  That would bring the room total to 415 guest rooms.

 

As the 1960s dawned, the Riviera was preparing to make the most of its assets. 

 

Special thanks to RoadsidePictures and UNLV Special Collections for letting us use these images.   Also, Special thanks to Dr. Michael Green, Prof. Eugene Moehring, George Stamos and Steve Fischer.