Mapes Hotel & Casino

A modern casino arrives in Reno

The Mapes Hotel opened on December 17, 1947, beside the Truckee River at 10 North Virginia Street. Its twelve-story tower was Nevada’s tallest building at the time. At the southern entrance to downtown Reno, it offered a new way to organize a resort: gambling, restaurants, lounges, hotel rooms, and a top-floor entertainment room stacked into a single vertical destination.

Architect F. H. Slocombe gave the building a strongly vertical appearance through projecting windows, a zigzag brick cornice, and regularly spaced finials. Large storefront windows and decorative terra cotta brought detail to the lower floors. The tower was not just a landmark to look at; its layout connected street-level activity with rooms and entertainment above.

The Mapes family controlled the hotel identity, while the opening gaming operation was leased to Lou Wertheimer, Leo Kind, Bernie Einstoss, and Frank Grannis. Hotel ownership and casino management were therefore distinct parts of the business. A congressional hearing later scrutinized a Reconstruction Finance Corporation loan used primarily to retire original construction debt. The hearing documents questions about public financing of the hotel; it does not by itself prove wrongdoing.

A day inside the Mapes

The hotel accommodated different kinds of stays. Reno Historical describes compact standard rooms built around a single twin bed that could also serve as a couch, alongside approximately forty much larger suites with living, dining, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom spaces. Some corner suites could be enlarged with additional bedrooms. The contrast helps explain how one building could serve short visits and longer stays.

Former publicist Harry Spencer remembered guests moving through a lobby and coffee shop to river-facing dining and then upstairs to the Sky Room. Bellmen delivered liquor, waiters handled meals and drinks, and elevator operators manually aligned the cars with each floor. These are attributed recollections of service and movement, not a claim that every visit unfolded in the same way.

Opening-day notices provide a more precisely dated rhythm: coffee service from 7 a.m., casino and cocktail service from 10 a.m., the Sky Room opening at 4:30 p.m., evening dining and a $3 buffet, then dancing until 2 a.m. Later visitors could dine in the Coach Room, which opened in 1958, or use the hotel for parties, banquets, proms, and dinner dates. The building belonged to Reno’s social life as well as its tourist economy.

The service behind that experience also had a labor history. A 1973 Nevada Supreme Court case concerned two Mapes bellmen and the question of counting tips toward the federal minimum wage. The court allowed the federal wage claim to proceed in Nevada courts and sent the case back. It is a specific legal dispute, but it reminds us that the polished guest experience depended on workers whose pay arrangements could be contested.

The Sky Room becomes a national stage

On the twelfth floor, the Sky Room brought dining, dancing, performances, and panoramic views together. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked across the river and downtown. The room included a dance floor and stage; period descriptions and photographs also place gambling within the upstairs experience. It was a versatile entertainment destination rather than simply a bar with a view.

Reno Historical identifies Liberace and Lili St. Cyr among the Mapes performers, and recalls Sammy Davis Jr. and Mickey Rooney during the 1960 Winter Olympics period. Other retrospective accounts add names such as Rudy Vallee and Tony Bennett. These sources establish a substantial entertainment tradition, although they do not supply a complete engagement calendar for every performer.

The Sky Room’s use changed over time. During a 1958–1959 hiatus in regular entertainment, it still accommodated private parties and banquets. Its significance was therefore not limited to headline nights: the same room could serve a touring performer, a civic gathering, or a local celebration. The Mapes combined national visibility with a place in the routines of its own city.

Hollywood, the Olympics, and unequal access

The Mapes became headquarters for the cast and crew of The Misfits during its 1960 Nevada production. The American Film Institute confirms that role, and the Nevada Film Office lists Mapes Casino among the filming locations. With Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, and Montgomery Clift involved in the production, the hotel became part of the practical infrastructure of a major film, not merely a backdrop to celebrity visits.

During the 1960 Winter Olympics, a top-floor room served as a press club equipped with telephones, typewriters, and teletype machines. In a later film connection, AFI’s California Split production notes explain that the Sky Room was redressed to resemble the lobby casino while the real casino continued operating below. The building’s vertical organization made it possible to separate a film set from a working gambling floor.

Celebrity visibility did not mean equal access. A Reno African American history project, drawing on Harry Spencer’s testimony, recounts Sammy Davis Jr. entering through a basement entrance, taking a freight elevator to perform in the Sky Room, and staying at a Lake Street motel rather than at the Mapes. This is oral-history testimony about segregation, not a reconstructed account of every engagement. It reveals the contradiction between welcoming a Black performer onstage and excluding him from the privileges available to guests.

Expansion, debt, and a changing market

The casino grew during the Mapes’ operating life. Its opening games included craps, roulette, twenty-one, and slots. A 1968 federal insurance case independently identifies the main table games and describes a working system of chip banks, credit slips, cash handling, and supervision. Such records show the organization behind the entertainment without turning one disputed loss into a claim about the whole business.

A two-story, 43,500-square-foot casino addition opened in 1978. Expansion, however, arrived as Reno’s market was becoming more competitive and the Mapes organization was exposed to obligations connected with the Money Tree and other business pressures. A larger casino floor did not automatically solve the problems of an aging hotel or a changing market.

The corporation entered Chapter 11 proceedings in 1980. Bankruptcy records show that creditors considered a remodeling program in 1981, so the business was still attempting to modernize under financial pressure. Those efforts became entangled in payment and design disputes. The decline is best understood as a chain of expansion costs, debt, competitive change, and dwindling operating resources, rather than one sudden event.

The tower’s condition complicated any later rescue. Retrospective accounts describe original furnishings and fixtures still present in many rooms and substantial modernization requirements. These details help explain the challenge a buyer faced; they do not establish that any single building system was the sole reason the hotel closed.

The building outlives the business

The Mapes closed on December 17, 1982, exactly thirty-five years after its opening. It entered the National Register of Historic Places in 1984, but recognition did not provide a ready-funded reuse plan. For years the vacant tower remained a visible question at the edge of downtown: could Reno preserve a landmark whose original business had disappeared?

Preservationists argued for adaptive reuse and challenged the city’s decision-making. City officials and engineers emphasized structural weaknesses and the expense of rehabilitation. The disagreement concerned both the value of the building and the practicality of keeping it. Acknowledging the engineering and financial objections does not diminish the historical importance that motivated the preservation campaign.

The tower was imploded on January 30, 2000. That was the end of the building, not the date the hotel-casino stopped operating. Separating the 1982 closure from the 2000 demolition reveals almost two decades in which the Mapes remained part of Reno’s civic life as a preservation issue.

Photographs, menus, matchbooks, chips, order records, and memories now preserve pieces of that vanished environment. Their value is not simply that they recall a famous name. Together they can show how guests moved through the hotel, how the casino operated, how workers served it, and why the loss of one building meant so much to the city.