Andy,
I know someone suggested in an earlier thread that maybe Ms. Williams, at her age, may have "forgotten" about the Holiday Queen. I spent over an hour with her prior to the banquet talking about the early days going back to the Clubs she and Shelby ran down in Galveston County, TX in the late 40's. With the recall she had for names and places going back over 50 years, I doubt she "forgot" about the Holiday Queen. I tend to think that if someone "put all the money we had into the place" you would remember the name(s) of the joint!

What the real story is I don't know. Gene's got the Burt records, so someone ordered chips, for some place. I know it was suppose to have been a short lived operation, but has anyone ever seen pictures of the place, napkins, postcards, matches or any of the usual stuff associated with a casino of that time? So far from what I've read, no one has found a phone listing for the place. A search of Ebay under "Holiday Queen Casino" yields 0 matches. A Yahoo search only brings up fellow club members who have a chip or at least a scan of a chip.

I have a post card (which has no date of course) that shows a view of the Strip from atop the Dunes. We can date the picture only to a 2-3 yr period. The Flamino Hilton name is on the facade of the SkyRoom. So we know it was '71 or after. The tower or the pink "Tulip sign" had not been erected, so it's prior to '75. There is a billboard for "Hughes Airwest" next to the Flamingo and they operated from '68-'79. The Barbary Coast wasn't built yet.

The Flamingo Capri and the Holiday Casino are clearly visible in the back ground of the card. Any of you entertainment experts out there can help if you can tell us what year that Tom Jones played Caesars at the same time that Jack Jones/Lonnie Shorr were appearing at the Flamingo Hilton.

The mystery continues, for now.