Benny Binion

In the world of poker the name of Benny Binion has achieved legendary status. This classic character of the gambling world died in 1989 but his legacy lives on at the casino on Fremont Street in Las Vegas. In addition, his sons Jack and Ted carried the torch first brought to the Nevada desert in the years right after World War II. Jack continued in this position for many years.

Benny Binion: The Early Days

According to personal accounts of Binion’s life and the excellent chapter in Players: The Men Who Made Las Vegas (Jack E. Sheehan, University of Nevada Press, 1997), Benny Binion lived a rather rough life in Texas, just a few miles from Dallas. Coming from a family of horse traders, he was the main breadwinner and head of the family while still in his teens. He eventually got into bootlegging whiskey and after being arrested twice, moved into the numbers rackets. He diversified into gambling, running craps games in hotel rooms and running gambling operations for the wealthy oil men near Beaumont, Texas.

Las Vegas Times: The Horseshoe

This activity and the competition in gambling and numbers eventually led to a rather “heated” situation for Binion. He packed up his family and the money he could gather and moved to Las Vegas in 1946. He first operated a casino with another man, beginning in 1947. But there were some disagreements between the owners, mainly because Binion wanted to cover higher betting limits. In 1951, he opened his own place, the famous Horseshoe on Fremont in downtown Las Vegas.

The Horseshoe had immediate success because Benny Binion set a $500 betting limit when most places were at $50. Binion focused on craps and a few other casino games, constantly battling competitors who wanted to restrict betting limits. Most people who have been around Las Vegas for decades credit Binion for making the town what it is. The family expanded its operations with purchase of the nearby Mint casino and hotel in 1988.

Play Poker? Eat Well!

Benny Binion was not one to set up elaborate nightclub entertainment in his casinos. He always focused on catering to gamblers. This was in evidence when he became one of the early proponents of the World Series of Poker. Credit for invention of the tournament goes to Tom Morehead of the Riverside Casino in Reno but when that man went out of business the Binions stepped in.

Binion was not a very good poker player, by all accounts. In fact, it wasn’t until they owned the Mint that they began to offer poker. In time, Benny Binion was to be closely associated with such legendary players as Puggy Pearson, Amarillo Slim Preston, Johnny Moss and Doyle Brunson.