Silvio Petricciani - University of Nevada, Reno

24 Silvio E. Petricciani
throughout the years, and every time he sees
me, he’s the first one to come up and say,
“Hello Sil, how are you?” and shake my hand.
So his success has not gone to his head as it
were. I like Bill—that’s about the best I can say.
“Baldy” West, I never really had too much
to do with Baldy. He was in the gambling
business around the town of Reno for many,
many years, a very sharp man, knew the
business backwards and forwards, Of course,
he’s dead now. And when my dad leased the
place out originally in 1943 when I went into
the Army, why Baldy was one of the partners
who came in here. And he subsequently
bought out all the rest of the partners and ran
the Palace Club until his lease expired.
And Baldy also was very successful man
in the business. When you lease something,
naturally unless the lease is very binding,
why, they didn’t do too many improvements
or anything. Of course, at the time that they
were in here, they couldn’t really because the
war was on, and materials were hard to get
and workmen were hard to get and so on. But
he ran a very—again, an honest business and
a very successful business. And then after we
came back to Reno, why I lost track of Baldy.
He was around town for quite a while and
worked in several establishments—I believe
over at the Horseshoe and the last I think was
down at the Holiday Hotel, if I recall. And
then he got sick and died. We weren’t the best
of friends; we were not the worst of friends,
said hello to each other and so on. There was
just a passing acquaintance that’s all.
Now we go to Bill Graham and Jim McKay
and Jack Sullivan. Those people I knew from
the time that I was a little boy and grew up
here. Of course, as I say, they were partners
of my dad upstairs in the old Palace Club and
then they moved down to what was known as
the Bank Club which is Harrah’s today. And
as I said before, my dad had the slot machines
in the Bank Club and so on. And when he
opened up over here, why then they decided
to agree to disagree—there was no contract.
In those days if you shook a man’s hand and
said, “You’re in,” you were in, and that was it.
I mean they didn’t have to have contracts in
those days and all written out, spelled out and
so on. But they were honorable men insofar
as if they said they would do something, why
that was it, they’d do it, period. Of course Jim
McKay and Bill Graham and Jack Sullivan,
they’re all three dead now.
Jack Sullivan was more or less, the
mainstay of the Bank Club. He was the
worker; he ran the casino, and he put in
many, many hours. And he was a very hard
taskmaster. But he ran a successful business.
And Bill and Jim had the old Cal-Neva at
the Lake. And they used to spend most their
summers up there, you know, running that
business up there. Jack was always here at the
Bank Club running the Bank Club. And of
course Bill Graham and Jim McKay both got
in trouble as we all know and went to jail for
a while over a few things that they did. And
Jack then ran the Bank Club all during the
time that they were in jail.
Of course, after I came back from the
Army why I renewed my acquaintances
with Bill and Jim. Jack had died, I think. If
he hadn’t died, he was a sick man—I forget
which. But then they eventually sold the old
Bank Club out to—I don’t know who it was
that they sold it out to because I was down in
Vegas at that time. And the Tomerlins bought
the Bank Club, the old Golden Hotel and
then it subsequently burned down. And they
built what they called the Golden, which is
history—and then Harrah’s bought them out
and built the hotel, which is what we have now
on the site of the old Bank Club.
Of course, Bill Harrah as he went along,
bought up property. During the time he was on