Casino Chip Show - Battle Creek (part 4 of 4)

The final installment of my four part series on my brother's and my trip to the Great Lakes Casino Chip Show in Battle Creek is just one final chip.  It's a chip I won via the 11:30am raffle.  And it's the one I've had the most trouble tracking down information on.

1.  Atlantic Maritime.  The AM was a management company that ran casinos on cruise ships off of Florida.  More or less.  There's more information on it here.  Thanks to collectors Albert Scalzo and Ricky Pushkin for pointing me in the right direction on this chip's background.  It joins a growing section of cruise chips I have.

Casino Chip Show - Battle Creek (part 3 of 4)

On to the chips I actually purchased from actual dealers at the actual show!

1.  Mandalay Bay - Rahman/Lewis November 17, 2001.  Limited to 2,500.  You might remember the $25 version of this chip from this post.  I had no idea there was a $5 version until I saw it in a display case.  It took me roughly .2 seconds to decide to buy it.  This was the rematch which Lewis won, meaning we had a new heavyweight champion who was NOT from the United States.  Fans of Jim Lampley will know what I am talking about.

2.  Luxor - Anubis.  The Luxor had three chips out at once that had a mythological theme.  I had Egyptian Queen one already, 19th one down here.  This one is Anubis, which is the Greek name for a jackal-headed god associated with the afterlife in Egyptian religion.  That makes one want to gamble, no?

3.  Luxor - Sphinx.  The final of the three, this one is designed to look like the entrance of the Luxor.

4.  Binion's Horseshoe Club - Stu "The Kid" Unger.  I think they spelled his name wrong, as everyone else goes with "Ungar."  A three time winner of the World Series of Poker's Main Event, Ungar had a book written about his life by Nolan Dalla that I thought was really good.

5.  Planet Hollywood - Grand Opening November 16 & 17, 2007.  Limited to 3,000.  A two day opening event!  That must've been quite a party.  #sarcasm

6.  Monte Carlo - Happy New Year 2005.  I'll collect just about any Monte Carlo chip that doesn't have Frank Caliendo on it.

7.  Silver Sevens.  Former Terrible's Casino, just off the strip.

8.  Silver Sevens - Grand Opening.  Opened in 2013.  Wonder how long it'll stay Silver Sevens?

Casino Chip Show - Battle Creek (part 2 of 4)

The second batch of chips from my brother (@ATRoss14) are all horse racing themed.  2014 will mark my 10th straight trip to the Kentucky Derby, so these are pretty cool to me.  They are:

1.  Riviera - The Run.  Undated, limited to 1,000 chips.

2.  Riviera - Kentucky Derby 2001.  Limited to 800 chips.  This race was on May 5 and won by Monarchos.  Giacomo in 2005 was my first Derby and the only year I haven't won a bet in the main race.

3.  Palms - 2005 Kentucky Derby Winner Giacomo.  Limited to 1,500.  Hey, what do you know, I was at that race.  Talk about your foreshadowing.  Giacomo was roughly a 50-1 shot and touched off a string of long shots winning the Derby in recent years.  Mine That Bird (50-1), Animal Kingdowm (21-1) and I'll Have Another (15-1) have all cashed tickets for me.

4.  Palms - 1977 Belmont Stakes Winner Seattle Slew.  Limited to 1,000.  The second to last Triple Crown winner, Seattle Slew accomplished that feat in 1977.

5.  Palms - 2004 Kentucky Derby Winner Smarty Jones.  Limited to 1500.  This was the year before I started going and the thing I remember most about this mega-favorite winning the race was an episode of the Nick and Jessica Simpson show where they went to the race and bet on Smarty.  At 4 to 1.  Big time.

6.  Palms - 1977 Preakness Winner Seattle Slew.  Limited to 1,000.  See #4.

7.  Palms - 2004 Preakness Winner Smarty Jones.  Limited to 1,000.  Wonder if the Simpsons made it to Baltimore for this race?  Smarty would finish second at the Belmont in 2004, narrowly missing out on the first Triple Crown since 1978 (Affirmed).

8.  Palms - 2003 Kentucky Derby Winner Funny Cide.  Limited to 1,500.  Funny Cide was a 13-1 winner in Louisville and won the Preakness before finishing third in the Belmont.

9.  Palms - 1977 Kentucky Derby Winner Seattle Slew.  Limited to 1,500.  The race that started Seattle Slew's march to the Triple Crown.  Seattle Slew was an incredible 1 to 2 to win the Derby.

Casino Chip Show - Battle Creek (part 1 of 4)

For the second consecutive year, I made the trek down to Battle Creek to attend the Great Lakes Chip Show.  This year my brother came along as well.  Before we even left for Cereal City, I got a handful of chips from him.  Some he just gave me out of the goodness of his heart and some he charged me for ($1 under face!).  First, the non-Las Vegas ones:

1.  Overland Hotel Reno - This chip looks old and I would have thought this was from a now-closed Casino but a quick google search shows that you can still book a room at the Overland Hotel on your next trip to Reno!  What?  You don't have a trip to Reno in the works?  Oh.

2.  Hilton Resort Reno

3.  Clarion Hotel Casino Reno

4.  Boomtown Hotel Casino - Jamboree Country - Verdi, NV.  Verdi is about 10 miles west of the Reno/Sparks metroplex.

5.  Gold River Gambling Hall & Resort, Laughlin, NV

6.  Golden Nugget, Laughlin, NV.  Man I wish Tim and Tom would come back and do a Fox reality show on this.

7.  Harrah's Tahoe.

Shower/Wedding Update

Received a total of 7 new chips as Wedding Shower and Wedding gifts.  I didn't even register for them!  They are:

1.  Seminole Casino, Immokalee, Florida (courtesy of Colleen).
2.  Celebrity Cruises (courtesy of Patty)

And the next 5 courtesy of my Aunt Denise and Uncle Tom, frequent contributors to my collection:

3.  Midnight Star, Deadwood, South Dakota
4.  Silverado, Deadwood, SD
5.  Mineral Palace, Deadwood, SD
6.  Four Aces, Deadwood, SD
7.  Cadillac Jacks, Deadwood, SD

June Update

Just one new chip added to the collection in June.  The house chip from the Oxford Casino in Oxford, Maine.  Made a quick stop while I was in Portland for work.  The casino was a year old and pretty busy for a random Tuesday afternoon at 2 in the afternoon.  The casino floor wasn't the biggest, but it was a pretty good size considering there can't be more than 150 people in Maine these days.  I didn't get a chance to play since the $10 blackjack tables were all full and I didn't feel like waiting around for an undetermined amount of time.  So after two laps I took my chip and left.  Good times.

By my count, Maine becomes the 18th different state I've collected a chip from.  I also have chips from 3 Canadian provinces and four other countries.

May Update

Four new chips added to the collection that I bought online.

1.  Aladdin - Lionel Richie.  Hello?  Is this the chip you're looking for?  From New Year's Eve 2004, this chip was limited to 5,000.  The opposite side is a "Coming in 2006 Planet Hollywood" design.  I'm kind of surprised it took me this long to get the Lionel chip though.  Always a strong jukebox play at the Pub.

2.  Aladdin - Grand Opening.  This is the 2000 second opening of the Aladdin.  It originally opened in 1966 and was imploded in 1998.  It reopened two years later and then in 2007 finally changed to Planet Hollywood.

3.  MGM Grand - Ty Murray.  This is another of the red/white edge chips that looks just like their Grand Opening, Julio Cesar Chavez and Betty Boop chips.  He's a 9-time World Champion rodeo cowboy and he's married to Jewel.  Not sure which accomplishment the chip is commemortating.

4.  Pioneer Club - Vegas Vic/Hoover Dam.  The Pioneer Club has a series of chips with the same Vegas Vic back and a historic Vegas fact/photo on the other side.  This one is for the completion of the Hoover Dam in 1936.  But I really like the Vic side of it, so I chose to go with that one.  The Pioneer Club was a downtown casino that closed 20 years ago.

Monte Carlo BrewPub

When the Monte Carlo fist opened on the Las Vegas Strip, they had a Brew Pub/Restaurant in the back near the tram stop.  I don't remember much about the place, but they did put out a commemorative chip for each of the six beers they brewed on site.  Each one was limited to 1200 chips and for the longest time I only had the Brewmaster Special.  But thanks to eBay, I was able to get the other five giving me the complete set.  They new five are:

1.  High Roller Red
2.  Silver State Stout
3.  Jackpot Pale
4.  Las Vegas Lites
5.  Winner's Wheat

Being I am mostly (but not always) a Miller Lite drinker, I would have probably been a fan of the Las Vegas Lite.  The area where the BrewPub was has been a couple different things in the last ten years but is now a sports bar called "The Pub."  Which is probably pretty much what they wanted the Brew Pub to be originally.  The new place has 300 beers on menu.  Seriously, look:

http://www.montecarlo.com/files/restaurants/the-pub-beer-menu.pdf

That's a lot of beers.  But none of their original microbrews.

Hollywood, FL

My second chip from the Sunshine State is in the books.  While on Spring Break in southern Florida, @LangeM77 and @taralayne0412 got me the house chip from the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood, FL.  Looks just like the Tampa one except for the location print.  Doesn't have the grim history of the Tampa location, which is where Anna Nicole Smith died, but I'm sure impromptu dance contests pop up at any moment.  Maybe if Anna Nichole Smith had been in Hollywood and not Tampa, David Caruso would have found the killer.  Anyways, glad to have this chip in my collection and glad those two are still going on Spring Break - even though they've been out of high school for nearly 20 years.  Woo!  Spring Break!

Casino Chip Show - Cleveland

This past weekend I was able to attend my second casino chip show, this one just outside of Cleveland.  I was expecting it to be bigger and grander than the one I attended in Battle Creek, but it was probably a little smaller.  And there seemed to be more non-chips on display, things like; ash trays, key cards, dice, signage and other stuff of that nature.  Nonetheless, I was able to come home with 8 new chips.

1.  Casino M8trix, San Jose, California.  Kind of cool looking chip from the new M8trix Casino.  The 8 in the name is in red so at first glance, I read the chip as "Casino Trix."

2.  Rivers Casino, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  My first chip from the Keystone State.  Pretty basic looking.

3.  Rio - Danny Gans.  Danny was called the "Man of Many Voices" and for a while advertisements for his show could be found on virtually every cab and bus in Vegas.  He performed at the Strat, the Mirage and the Rio before dying in 2009 at age 52.  I had no idea he was a pro baseball player and only stopped playing due to an injury to his Achilles tendon.  The theater at the Mirage is named after him.

4.  Holiday Inn Casino Boardwalk - Grand Opening.  The Boardwalk opened in 1995 - it seemed way older than that.  Had a great Strip location between the Bellagio and Monte Carlo.  Also had a fake roller coaster on top of their main entrance, long before casinos started putting actual roller coasters inside.  It was imploded in 2006 and the City Center now sits where I used to play $3 blackjack.

5.  Blue Man Group - Monte Carlo.  The Blue Man Group moved to the Monte Carlo after fairly lengthy runs at the Luxor and the Venetian.

6.  Stardust - Legendary Old-Timer Bill Boyd.  This chip was put out in 1998 and limited to 2,000 chips.  Bill Boyd is a four-time winner of the 5 Card Stud event at the World Series of Poker. 

7.  Tropicana - Folies Bergere 35th Anniversary.  Maybe that's why the Trop smells like old people - they have the same acts for 35 years.

8.  Flamingo, New Orleans.  I really like the look of this chip, with the small font and dark colors.  Good job Flamingo, NO.