Harvey Allen grew up poor in Philadelphia. After taking singing lessons at the Artie Singer Vocal School, he got jobs singing in night clubs up and down the east coast. He also took acting classes in New York and performed at the Copa Club. In the 1950s, he moved to Las Vegas, Nevada and auditioned for Jack Entratter at the Sands Hotel and Casino where he performed with numerous entertainers including Lena Home, Louis Armstrong, Tallulah Bankhead and Robert Merrill.
Benjamin Gill arrived in Goldfield from Seattle, Washington around 1905. An accountant, Gill worked for a number of mining and brokerage companies. From 1906, he was secretary and local agent for the Begole Mining Syndicate, owned by mining financier, F. H. Begole, of Marquette, Michigan. He also acted as secretary for the Nevada Registration and Trust Company of Goldfield.
Bobby Morris (born Boruch Moishe Stempelman) was born June 30, 1927 and immigrated from Wilno, Poland to Brooklyn, New York in 1937. His passion for drumming was ignited soon after, and he began shining shoes to pay for drumming lessons from Henry Adler. At the age of thirteen, Morris got his first gig playing at the Musicians Union in the Catskill Mountains during the summer. He soon developed a career playing jazz around town with different artists while simultaneously studying at the Manhattan School of Music.
Mel Exber (1923-2002) was an innovative sports book operator and the longtime owner of the Las Vegas Club casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. Exber was born in Brooklyn, New York on October 3, 1923. He served in the Army Air Corps during World War II and moved to Las Vegas in 1947. With his business partner, Jackie Gaughan, Exber opened the Saratoga Sports Book in 1953. Exber bought the Las Vegas Club in 1960, and also owned interests in the El Cortez, Plaza, Club Bingo, Western, Nevada, Gold Spike, and Barbary Coast.
Dorothy Frassmann was born October 29, 1931 in Brooklyn, New York. Right before her parents divorced while she was five, Frassmann moved to Canada to live with her great aunt. She moved back to the United States when she was ten years old because World War II started. She met her husband, Lewis, when she was 15 and he was 20 or 21; they married only a month after meeting each other in Texas. After a series of turmoil between Frassmann and Lewis, they got divorced less than a year later. She was left to support herself in Hubbard, Texas at the age of 15.
Thomas J. Schoeman was born May 18, 1949 in Brooklyn, New York, and was the first of his four siblings to graduate high school and attend college. Schoeman attended Nassau Community College and then transferred to the University of New Mexico in the early 1970s, from which he graduated in 1974. After spending his first five years out of college working as an architect in New Mexico, Schoeman received a job offer from Jack Miller and Associates (later, JMA Studio) and moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, in 1979.
Jay Poster was born October 16, 1954 in Brooklyn, New York. He grew up in San Diego, California.
Music brought Jay Poster to Las Vegas for a brief time in 1974. Jay wanted to pursue a musical career and his cousin was a professional musician with the Nat Brandwynne Orchestra at Caesars Palace. Poster left Las Vegas to return home to San Diego and his studies at San Diego State University. It would be over a decade later before Jay returned to Las Vegas to live and this time it became permanent.
Leo Lewis was born August 24, 1930 in Long Island, New York. He held many positions in various Las Vegas, Nevada hotels and casinos, including the general manager of the Barbary Coast Hotel and Casino and a casino executive in Binion's Horseshoe Club. He retired in 1989, and later taught casino management in University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). He assisted in the development of the College of Hotel Administration (William F. Harrah College of Hospitality) at UNLV. He died July 17, 2001.