Fun with Maps ISSUE 2025-050

By Steve Kovacs (Introduction by Chuck Gibson)

LOVELAND, OH (March 19, 2025) – In today’s edition of Fun with Maps, we take a peek at “sin city” – if it happens there, it stays there!

VIVA LAS VEGAS

The Nevada state legislature voted to legalize gambling in the state on March 19, 1931.  The impetus was a hope to move forward from the effects of the Great Depression.

Settlers were few and far between in the Nevada territory until the discovery of silver and gold led to mining developments.  However, by the 1920s, mining was drying up and the population was in decline.

With the introduction of gambling and divorce in 1932, the legislature hoped to woo people back and also to entice visitors to the area.

The Mob can take much of the credit for the early rise of Las Vegas, with its casinos and hotels, becoming a world destination for entertainment. 

Reno and Las Vegas duked it out to become the leaders, but Las Vegas won the gambling title while Reno is better known as the “divorce capital of the world”.

This pictorial map by Caples of Reno is from 1935 and notes all the Nevada ‘sins’ – drinking, gambling and divorce.  Prostitution was legalized later, but not where one could gamble.

Steve Kovacs and his wife Theresa reside in Loveland, Ohio where they raised their two children. He is a passionate collector of antique maps.

Visit his antique map boutique world-on-paper online. Watch for his daily feature Steve Kovacs: Fun with Maps here on Loveland Beacon.