In 1953, Marble Manor became home to a growing number of Las Vegas residents at a time when adequate housing was scarce — especially for African-Americans who were barred from living in many parts of the city. What began as a necessary housing development soon became a cornerstone of community life on the Historic Westside. Now, as we prepare to launch an oral history project and documentary chronicling Marble Manor’s legacy, we are asking for your help.

Despite its popularity, poker is not a major revenue generator for casinos. According to the most recent available data from the UNLV Center for Gaming Research, poker generated less than 2 percent of annual revenue for the “average” Strip casino in 2024.

March is Women's History Month, so we’re putting your Vegas knowledge to the test: How well do you know the women who shaped our city? We bring back a conversation between Vogue Robinson and Dr. Su Kim Chung, Head of Public Services in Special Collections and Archives at UNLV Libraries. She shares the stories of five iconic women who helped shape the city — and whose impact every Las Vegan should know.

This shift away from a reliance on gaming is highlighted in a recent University of Nevada, Las Vegas study on departmental revenue for the big LV strip properties.

Historians say the contributions of Black women during that era helped shape the city’s cultural and economic identity.

One of this work’s main contributions is the analysis of the relationship between a difficult past and a tourism-oriented future, heard in the voices of those who are often ignored but directly affected by planning strategies and policies.

The Moulin Rouge Agreement opened Strip casinos to Black patrons, but full workplace integration took more than a decade longer

Las Vegas sold glamour long before it sold equality. In the mid-20th century, the Strip proudly booked Black entertainers to headline its most famous showrooms — while quietly denying many of them the right to fully exist in the same spaces they helped make profitable, according to historical accounts from the Nevada State Museum and local historians documenting segregation-era Las Vegas.

The earliest settlers and their direct descendants became notable leaders throughout Las Vegas in the 20th century, helped build up the Historic Westside, and now make up the African American community across the Las Vegas Valley.

The project is part of the HUNDRED Plan, an acronym for Historic Urban Neighborhood Design Redevelopment. In 2016, residents worked with graduate students from UNLV to create a vision for what they wanted to see on the Historic Westside.

During the segregation era, Black residents, workers, and entertainers were largely pushed off the Strip and into the Westside because of discriminatory housing and business practices that limited where they could live and gather, according to historians and oral histories preserved by UNLV and local museums. What could have been a story of isolation instead became one of creation. Block by block, the Westside developed its own ecosystem of hotels, restaurants, clubs, and gathering spaces that welcomed people the Strip shut out.

Long before Las Vegas became the diverse media market it is today, Black journalists and radio personalities were helping shape local storytelling in a city where representation on air was limited. According to historical accounts archived by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) Special Collections and longtime community historians, early Black broadcasters played a critical role in expanding who delivered the news — and whose stories were told.