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ent000898-002

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ent000898-002
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    University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Libraries

    2 When the Sands opened in December 1952, producer Jack Entratter, one of the main owners who had come here from a half-ownership in New York's Copacabana, startled the blase Vegas show pro- ducers with his own ideas in entertainment that had helped project the Copacabana into the Number One spot in America. Entratter brought in Danny Thomas for his first Las Vegas nightclub engage- ment and surrounded him with 14 beautiful CopaGirls in costumes and production numbers. Visitors to Las Vegas fought to see the Sands show, news of which had spread from mouth-to-mouth as the "best show in town". When the other complacent hotels missed many customers that had been satisfied previously to see a mediocre show simply because there wasn't a single outstanding production in town, they started looking the situation over and the competition started, which resulted in sky-high bidding for talent, rising to offers of $40,000 to $50,000 a week for individual stars. But Entratter had forseen the mad rush and gathered around him most of the nightclub stars who had already proven to be big business-getters in bistros more-