Five Fun Facts about Las Vegas:
• Las Vegas is the largest American city founded in the 20th century.
• In the 1800s, areas of the Las Vegas Valley contained artesian wells that supported extensive green areas or meadows—meadow is vega in Spanish—hence the name Las Vegas.
• As of the 2004 census estimate, the Las Vegas metropolitan area contains the largest Hawaiian community outside of Hawaii.
• Las Vegas has four Sister Cities: Angeles City (Pampanga, Philippines), An San (South Korea), Huludao (China), and Phuket (Thailand).
• In 1968, Howard Hughes purchased the Desert Inn after being asked to leave by management. Hughes had occupied the entire top floor for 10 days prior to purchase.
• CSI began here when alumni Anthony Zuiker came up with the idea for CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, which has expanded to CSI: Miami and CSI: New York. He is now an accomplished screenwriter, creator, and executive producer of the smash hits that have earned him multiple awards, including an Emmy nomination for best dramatic series.
Famous People from Las Vegas:
Andre Agassi, Greg Anthony, Kurt and Kyle Busch, Charisma Carpenter, Spencer Clark, Ricky Davis, Guy Fieri, Carey Hart, Jenna Jameson, The Killers, Jack Kramer, Stephanie Louden, Stephanie Romanov, Adam Seward, Barry Zito, Anthony Zuiker
Local Slang:
The Cage – Where a casino keeps its money; normally, the casino only has one.
Chips – Casinos have their own chips in denominations of $1, $5, $25, $100, and up.
Comp – Many people use comp as a noun, referring to whatever they were given for free; they also say they were comped, which as it turns out, is also not a real word.
Gaming – The politically correct term for gambling
High Roller – A person who makes big bets