Harvey's Lake Tahoe Hotel and Casino Collection (MS-00475)

Harvey's Lake Tahoe Hotel and Casino opened in 1944 as a one-room cabin on seven acres off U. S. highway 50 in Lake Tahoe, near the Nevada-California border. Built by Harvey Gross, a California businessman, and his wife Llewellyn, the Wagon Wheel Saloon & Gambling Hall featured three slot machines, two card tables, lunches cooked and served by Llewellyn, and the only 24-hour gas pump between Placerville, California and Carson City, Nevada. Because the area was snow-bound during the winter and the road considered impassable by the state, area businesses suffered until Harvey and his neighbors shoveled the road free of snow, proving it was possible. The state built a maintenance station the following spring, opening the area to year-round trade. The influx of tourists allowed Harvey's Wagon Wheel to rapidly expand, soon covering an entire city block.

In the 1960s, Gross changed the name of the casino to Harvey's Resort Hotel & Casino, and expanded again, becoming the first high-rise in the area with eleven floors and 197 rooms. This trend of expansion continued for the next two decades, briefly interrupted in 1980, when an extortionist managed to plant a large and sophisticated bomb in the telephone exchange area of the hotel. Gross rebuilt and oversaw the grand opening of the new Harvey's in 1981.

Harvey Gross's interest in gambling and the casino industry spurred his collection of gambling tokens, chips, and artifacts, as well as his decision to hire Harvey J. Fuller to complete his historical index of gambling establishments in Nevada. While Gross did not live to see his gambling museum to fruition, his original Wagon Wheel Saloon, now called Harvey's Lake Tahoe, remains in operation as of 2018.

Source:

"Harveys Casino Resorts History," Funding Universe.com, last accessed May 15 2018, http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/harveys-casino-resorts-history/

"A Byte Out of History: The Case of the Harvey's Casino Bomb," FBI.gov, last accessed May 15 2018, https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2009/august/a-byte-out-of-history-harveys-casino-bomb

Harvey J. Fuller (1919-2004) was raised in Southern California, attending college before joining the army air corp during World War II. After the war, he joined the Los Angeles police department, serving from 1946 until 1977. An inveterate collector, Fuller took up collecting gaming tokens after seeing a display at Harvey's Resort Hotel in the late 1960s.

In the process of collecting tokens, he developed a deep interest in the backgrounds of the casinos that produced them and by 1970 he had changed from just collecting tokens to uncovering information on every Nevada club and casino that featured live gambling. In his pursuit of his research, Fuller and his wife spent every summer in Nevada, based in Las Vegas and traveling across the state visiting casinos and clubs in every town they passed.

Hired by Harvey's Resort Hotel curator of collections Howard Herz in the 1970s to complete his research, Fuller sought out both official and unofficial records and interviewed owners, patrons, and neighboring businesses for information. Initially writing his notes on the backs of keno slips, he eventually moved to full-size sheets of paper for storage and consistency.

In 1991, Howard Herz published Harvey J. Fuller's Index of Nevada Gambling Establishments. To date, this is the only published research based on Fuller's extensive notes of over 2400 establishments. Fuller continued to collect and research gambling chips and tokens until his death in 2004.

Source:

Herz, Howard W., "Harvey J. Fuller, 1919-2004," last accessed May 15 2018, http://www.ccgtcc-ccn.com/Harvey%20Fuller.pdf