Las Vegas

Author : Stefan Al
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 026203574X
Total Pages : 267 pages
Book Rating : 4.43/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Strip written by Stefan Al and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2017-03-03 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The transformations of the Strip—from the fake Wild West to neon signs twenty stories high to “starchitecture”—and how they mirror America itself. The Las Vegas Strip has impersonated the Wild West, with saloon doors and wagon wheels; it has decked itself out in midcentury modern sleekness. It has illuminated itself with twenty-story-high neon signs, then junked them. After that came Disney-like theme parks featuring castles and pirates, followed by replicas of Venetian canals, New York skyscrapers, and the Eiffel Tower. (It might be noted that forty-two million people visited Las Vegas in 2015—ten million more than visited the real Paris.) More recently, the Strip decided to get classy, with casinos designed by famous architects and zillion-dollar collections of art. Las Vegas became the “implosion capital of the world” as developers, driven by competition, got rid of the old to make way for the new—offering a non-metaphorical definition of “creative destruction.” In The Strip, Stefan Al examines the many transformations of the Las Vegas Strip, arguing that they mirror transformations in America itself. The Strip is not, as popularly supposed, a display of architectural freaks but representative of architectural trends and a record of social, cultural, and economic change. Al tells two parallel stories. He describes the feverish competition of Las Vegas developers to build the snazziest, most tourist-grabbing casinos and resorts—with a cast of characters including the mobster Bugsy Siegel, the eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes, and the would-be political kingmaker Sheldon Adelson. And he views the Strip in a larger social context, showing that it has not only reflected trends but also magnified them and sometimes even initiated them. Generously illustrated with stunning color images throughout, The Strip traces the many metamorphoses of a city that offers a vivid projection of the American dream.

Author : Eugene P. Moehring
Publisher : University of Nevada Press
ISBN 13 : 0874176476
Total Pages : 377 pages
Book Rating : 4.76/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Las Vegas written by Eugene P. Moehring and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2005-03-16 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The meteoric rise of Las Vegas from a remote Mormon outpost to an international entertainment center was never a sure thing. In its first decades, the town languished, but when Nevada legalized casino gambling in 1931, Las Vegas met its destiny. This act—combined with the growing popularity of the automobile, cheap land and electricity, and changing national attitudes toward gambling—led to the fantastic casinos and opulent resorts that became the trademark industry of the city and created the ambiance that has made Las Vegas an icon of pleasure. This volume celebrates the city’s unparalleled growth, examining both the development of its gaming industry and the creation of an urban complex that over two million people proudly call home. Here are the colorful characters who shaped the city as well as the political, business, and civic decisions that influenced its growth. The story extends chronologically from the first Paiute people to the construction of the latest megaresorts, and geographically far beyond the original township to include the several municipalities that make up today’s vast metropolitan Las Vegas area.

Author : Peter Lik
Publisher : Peter Lik's Wilderness Press Pty
ISBN 13 : 9781876585280
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.85/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Las Vegas and Beyond written by Peter Lik and published by Peter Lik's Wilderness Press Pty. This book was released on 2006 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Internationally renowned Australian photographer depicts Las Vegas and its environs through a series of lush, panoramic shots. The artist describes the area as a "neon oasis embraced by a spiritual land", and as his photography shows, Las Vegas and the Nevada desert are home to some striking and beautiful visual extremes.

Author : Joe Oesterle
Publisher : Sterling Publishing Company
ISBN 13 : 9781402739408
Total Pages : 270 pages
Book Rating : 4.00/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Weird Las Vegas and Nevada written by Joe Oesterle and published by Sterling Publishing Company. This book was released on 2007 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A travel guide to Las Vegas that also focusses on the neglection of its historic places.

Author : Geoff Schumacher
Publisher : Stephens Press, LLC
ISBN 13 : 9781932173147
Total Pages : 294 pages
Book Rating : 4.45/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Sun, Sin & Suburbia written by Geoff Schumacher and published by Stephens Press, LLC. This book was released on 2004 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: People all over the globe know Las Vegas as gambling's Mecca, Sin City, the Entertainment Capital of the World, a resort destination that attracts more than 35 million visitors per year. But that's just one piece of the story of this fascinating metropolis of 1.5 million people - and counting. With more than 6,000 people rushing to the valley each month, Las Vegas responded to the influx with enthusiasm and a can-do attitude, all while coping with enormous economic, social and political challenges. This carefully documented history focuses on the most exciting and chaotic decade in Las Vegas history: the 1990s. Veteran journalist Geoff Schumacher captures the true essence of Las Vegas, seeing past the neon and discovering the multi-faceted communities beyond.

Author : John O'Brien
Publisher : Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN 13 : 0802197299
Total Pages : 174 pages
Book Rating : 4.90/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Leaving Las Vegas written by John O'Brien and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This “brutal and unflinching” novel of fleeting love in Sin City inspired the film starring Nicholas Cage and Elizabeth Shue (Jay McInerney, author of Bright Lights, Big City). John O’Brien’s debut novel, Leaving Las Vegas, is an emotionally wrenching story of a woman who embraces life and a man who rejects it; a powerful tale of hard luck, hard drinking, and a relationship of tenderness and destruction. An avowed alcoholic, Ben drinks away his family, friends, and, finally, his job. With deliberate resolve, he burns the remnants of his life and heads for Las Vegas to end it all in the last great binge of his hopeless life. On the Strip, he picks up Sera, a prostitute, in what might have become another excess in his self-destructive jag. Instead, their chance meeting becomes a respite on the road to oblivion as they form a bond that is as mysterious as it is immutable.

Author : David Demontmollin
Publisher : Justin, Charles & Co.
ISBN 13 : 193211243X
Total Pages : 265 pages
Book Rating : 4.36/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Las Vegas Little Black Book written by David Demontmollin and published by Justin, Charles & Co.. This book was released on 2005 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The bachelor party/guy's weekend has become a staple of the Las Vegas strip. The Las Vegas Little Black Book knows what men want from their weekend in Sin City, where to find it, how much to pay for it and how to go home satisfied.

Author : Mark Gottdiener
Publisher : Wiley-Blackwell
ISBN 13 : 9781577181378
Total Pages : 304 pages
Book Rating : 4.79/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Las Vegas written by Mark Gottdiener and published by Wiley-Blackwell. This book was released on 2000-01-10 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most writing about Las Vegas focuses on the spectacular story of casino gambling and tourism. This book is different. Written by two renowned urban studies scholars and a local Las Vegas journalist, combining scholarly research with investigative reporting First academic book to provide a synthesis on the recent growth of Las Vegas Appropriate for courses in urban studies, economic development and tourism, communities and cultural studies

Author : Hunter S. Thompson
Publisher : HarperCollins UK
ISBN 13 : 0007596715
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.13/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (Harper Perennial Modern Classics) written by Hunter S. Thompson and published by HarperCollins UK. This book was released on 2014-10-16 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ‘We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like, “I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive ...”’

Author : Richard Zoglin
Publisher : Simon & Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1501151207
Total Pages : 304 pages
Book Rating : 4.00/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Elvis in Vegas written by Richard Zoglin and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2020-11-10 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Outstanding pop-culture history.” —Newsday The “smart and zippy account” (The Wall Street Journal) of how Las Vegas saved Elvis and Elvis saved Las Vegas in the greatest musical comeback of all time. Elvis’s 1969 opening night in Vegas was his first time back on a live stage in more than eight years. His career had gone sour—bad movies, mediocre pop songs that no longer made the charts—and he’d been dismissed by most critics as over-the-hill. But in Vegas he played the biggest showroom in the biggest hotel in the city, drawing more people for his four-week engagement than any other show in Vegas history. His performance got rave reviews; “Suspicious Minds,” the song he introduced there, gave him his first number-one hit in seven years; and Elvis became Vegas’s biggest star. Over the next seven years, he performed more than 600 shows there, and sold out every one. Las Vegas was changed, too. By the end of the ‘60s, Vegas’ golden age—when the Rat Pack led a glittering array of stars who made it the nation’s premier live-entertainment center—was losing its luster. Elvis created a new kind of Vegas show: an over-the-top, rock-concert extravaganza. He set a new bar for Vegas performers, with the biggest salary, the biggest musical production, and the biggest promotion campaign the city had ever seen. He opened the door to a new generation of pop/rock artists and brought a new audience to Vegas—not the traditional well-heeled older gamblers, but a mass audience from Middle America that Vegas depends on for its success to this day. At once “a fascinating history of Vegas as gambling capital, celebrity playground, mob hangout, [and] entertainment Valhalla” (Rolling Stone) and the incredible “tale of how the King got his groove back” (Associated Press), Elvis in Vegas is a classic feel-good story for the ages.