Las Vegas Sun

March 18, 2024

OPINION:

No tall tales: 20 facts to mark 20 years of the Stratosphere

Lonnie Hammargren Home Tour

Steve Marcus

The High Roller roller coaster from the Stratosphere tower is shown at Lonnie Hammargren’s home Oct. 22, 2015.

When I explain to folks how long I have lived in Las Vegas, I tell them, “I have lived here as long as the Stratosphere.”

True. I moved to Las Vegas from Redding, Calif., the weekend of April 30, 1996. I was living temporarily (aren’t we all?) in an apartment on West Sahara Avenue, and the first day I woke up, the new hotel was practically casting a shadow over my new dwelling.

“This is crazy,” I thought.

Then I went to lunch with Dave Kirvin and Steve Stallworth, who would become great friends of mine.

“I live next door to this Stratosphere place,” I said to Stallworth, a former UNLV quarterback and currently the arena director at South Point.

“Welcome to Vegas!” he said.

Since, I’ve visited the Stratosphere many times, impressing visiting friends and family members with the view at the observation deck at the top of the main tower and enjoying the singularly impressive view from the Top of the World restaurant.

These days, the hotel still casts a tall shadow. I can see her from my deck, all the time. The Big Shot, X-Scream and Insanity thrill rides are in full view. I can almost hear the screams.

As we reach our 20th anniversary, here are 20 fun facts about the Strat:

20: The original High Roller in Las Vegas was a Stratosphere rollercoaster, open from 1996 to 2005.

19: At 1,149 feet to the tip of its needle, the Strat is the tallest building west of the Mississippi River.

18: Donald Trump ignored the Stratosphere (and others) in October when he claimed, on Twitter, that the Trump was the “tallest/most beautiful building in town.” Trump International’s listed height is 624 feet; Palazzo’s is 643, Encore is 630, and the yet-completed Fontainebleu is 673.

17: The distance from the SkyJump bungee ride to the street, 855 feet, is higher than the rooftop of any Vegas resort except the Stratosphere.

16: The late impressionist Danny Gans was the hotel’s original headliner, and his $26 ticket was the best bargain in the city.

15: The strategy behind service at the Top of the World is for the restaurant to slowly turn a single rotation during your meal.

14: Three years almost to the day of its opening, a fire broke out in the under-construction main tower, sending ash and debris to Las Vegas Boulevard and causing construction delays.

13: The winner of the 2015 Scale the Strat stair-climb race, Sproule Love, covered the 108 floors and 1,455 steps in 7 minutes, 22 seconds.

12: Claire Sinclair, 2011 Playboy Playmate of the Year and start of the stage show “Pin Up,” lives at the hotel.

11: In the weeks after the closing of the vampire-themed adult revue “Bite,” and in what is described as unrelated incidents, bats were spotted flying through the hotel’s showroom.

10: In one of the great Vegas resort concepts never realized, original owner Bob Stupak envisioned a ride designed as King Kong, at a height of 70 feet and costing $6 million, that would scale the exterior of the building. The elevator-styled attraction would have featured a viewing compartment inside the ape’s belly.

9: The hotel offers 2,500 rooms. By comparison, that is about 1,100 more than Tropicana and about 1,000 fewer than Flamingo.

8: Upon opening, a bronze statue of Stupak was displayed at the resort. It disappeared three months later when Stupak stepped down as the hotel’s chairman of the board.

7: Stupak’s original property on that parcel, the Million Dollar Historic Gambling Museum, opened March 31, 1974. On May 21, 1974, the building burned down after an air conditioner caught fire.

6: The hotel that preceded Stratosphere, Bob Stupak’s Vegas World, was open from 1979 to 1995 and was the first hotel to offer true even-money, red-black odds on the roulette table (no green slots) and was the first where employees’ name tags listed their original hometowns.

5: Stupak once playfully copied the Trump board game by producing a novelty game of his own, called Stupak.

4: The idea of incorporating an observation deck at the top of the main tower was that of then-Las Vegas City Councilman Steve Miller.

3: Stupak originally envisioned a tower of 1,800 feet, but the Federal Aviation Administration would not approve that height.

2: The original High Roller coaster belongs to famed Nevada historian and former Lt. Gov. Lonnie Hammargren.

1: Somewhere exists a collection of “King Kong” silver coins, minted in honor of the Belly of the Beast ride.

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