1905 - The Beginning Las Vegas, a City later famed for its sinful pleasures, was claimed as domain by Clan Giovanni as of 1905. The year Senator Clark's railroad had been successfully connected between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. 600 sites were auctioned off that year by Senator Clark in May, with hopes of building a city. But all was eventually lost. For those that had settled and started to build, were the victim of mysterious fires which burned down everything on September 5th of that year. Strange how the Giovanni were there to pick up the pieces and to help the city build once again. But maybe not. No one asked any questions, they were just happy to be able to start over again even though they owed this family of Giovanni much and forever in debt for their kindness. Many in the kindred world of the West wondered why the Giovanni would take interest of this barren desert. The occult community, however, whispered of the spot's great significance...

1907- The first telephone wires are installed on Fremont Street in Las Vegas in the Hotel Nevada office of Charles "Pop" Squires. Who was the prominent pioneer newspaper editor and publisher, he was sometimes called the "Father of Las Vegas." He was even referred to as "Mr. Las Vegas" before singer Wayne Newton captured the title.

1909 - The State of Nevada bans gambling. Illegal gambling continues, and is generally accepted, until gambling becomes legal again in 1931. The Giovanni were known to make back room deals in order to assure that Las Vegas did not lose its purpose for drawing in those souls that wished to invest in unknowingly their livelihood to both the Necromancers, and to the establishments that kept the family in lavish settings.

1911 - March 16: Las Vegas officially becomes a city. What a display of celebration it was and the Giovanni hosted one of the only parties that held known political figures. Who knows what happened behind those heavy doors.

1919 - The 18th Amendment, Prohibition, is ratified. All consumption, manufacturing and selling of liquor is banned. Soon after, Congress passes the Volstead Act penalizing those who violate Prohibition. Except for the Ventrue and Giovanni.

1923 - Edward Taylor announces plans for Las Vegas' first "high-class resort," called Twin Lakes. It would include boating, fishing, an outdoor swimming pool and a dance hall. What most do not know is that eventual site for Twin Lakes was not the original planned. At some point during the construction, workers began to get spooked by strange happenings and disappearances. The area was ultimately abandoned, but the Giovanni would maintain control of this well-gated and secured yet seemingly barren area from this point forward.

1926 - May 23: Daily passenger air service begins in Las Vegas, adding the use of airmail service by Western Express. Las Vegas is the only intermediate stop on the new commercial airway, which places it importantly and definitely on the air map of the country.

1928 - December 21: The Boulder Canyon Project Act passes in the House and Senate, placing the nation behind the construction of a dam on the Colorado River. Run by Ernie Cragin and William Pike, the El Portal Theater opens on Fremont Street, just in time for the spread of "talkies" that began replacing silent pictures. The first film it shows is a unreleased version of Ladies and the Mob, starring one of the biggest movie stars of the 1920s, Clara Bow.

1931 - The Nevada Legislature repeals the act banning gambling. Although gambling has flourished underground, it has officially been illegal for years.

1933 - Prohibition is repealed. 1935 - September: President Franklin Roosevelt dedicates the Boulder Dam. With the completion of the dam, Las Vegas once again slows down.

1938 - Authorities in Los Angeles begin cracking down on illegal gambling circuits. Seeking refuge, many of these ousted gamblers and gangsters flee to Las Vegas. Los Angeles police commander and casino operation Guy McAfee opens "The 91 Club" on Highway 91, later known as "the Strip."

1944 - November: Liberace makes his Las Vegas debut. The showman, who would be described by Time magazine as "a synonym for glorious excess," would become a staple of Vegas entertainment, and by 1972 would be earning a record $300,000 a week, more than any other Vegas headliner at the time.

1946 - The state of Nevada begins levying gaming taxes. Gaming becomes a supplemental source of the state's revenue. December 26: The Flamingo Hotel, built with mob money by Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel, opens prematurely. Unlike other resorts on the strip that flaunt an Old West style, the Flamingo is a glamorous destination for high rollers. But without a finished hotel, Siegel loses revenue and is forced to close the resort until construction is completed.

1947 - March: The Flamingo reopens for business. This time, Siegel's attempt is successful, and the resort begins turning a profit by the end of the month. June: Ben Siegel is murdered in Virginia Hill's Beverly Hills estate. His death sparks an enormous amount of publicity for Las Vegas, and Americans begin to see Las Vegas as a more glamorous, risky city.

1950 - Spring: The Special Committee to Investigate Organized Crime in Interstate Commerce, known popularly as the Kefauver Committee, hearings begin. Senator Estes Kefauver and his colleagues interrogate hundreds of witnesses in fourteen cities over the course of fifteen months in an investigation of organized crime in America. Some 30 million Americans watch the hearings broadcast live on television. November 15: The Kefauver Committee comes to Las Vegas. The committee hears the testimony of merely six witnesses, and after less than a full day of inquiries, calls the Las Vegas portion of the investigation to an end.

1952 - April 22: For the first time, the press is invited to view and broadcast the detonation of a nuclear device on the Nevada Proving Grounds. Americans watch the detonation of the 31-kiloton device from the safety of their living rooms. The evening of the atomic test, the newly burgeoning city known for its vibrancy and sin, was said to have gone quiet. Not in any truly placeable manner, but those few who remember the incident or wrote of it, talked about a malaise setting over the entire city...Kindred and kine alike.

1953 - Clan Tremere establishes a Chantry within the Giovanni domain. The circumstances are unknown as to why within the Kindred community, but it is well known that Regent Meyer Roth was specifically invited by the Giovanni Don.

1957 - January 10: Topless showgirls make their Las Vegas debut with Minsky's Follies at the Desert Inn.

1959 - The Nevada State Legislature creates the Nevada Gaming Commission. Welcome to Las Vegas Sign. Betty Willis designs "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas." In 1959, when the sign is completed, Willis sells it for $4,000 to Clark County officials, who place the sign on an island on the southern tip of the Strip, where it remains to this day.

1963 - The Green Felt Jungle, an exposé on the organized crime connections in Las Vegas, is published. Along with a secret FBI investigation of the Syndicate's "skim," Las Vegas' tarnished image continues to draw tourists.

1966 - Thanksgiving: Howard Hughes arrives in Las Vegas, taking over the top two floors of the Desert Inn. For four years, Hughes remains in his room, from where he negotiates business deals that change Las Vegas forever.

1967 - April: Hughes buys the Desert Inn instead of submitting to eviction. It is the first of a slew of hotels he buys in the next three years.

1969 - July 26: Elvis Presley debuts his Las Vegas act at the International, eventually signing a five-year contract for four weeks, twice a year for a sum of $125,000 per week. Between 1969 and 1977, Elvis plays Las Vegas exclusively at the International, 837 shows in total.

1970-- The population of Clark County reaches 277,230. Thanksgiving: Hughes leaves Las Vegas four years after arriving. In that time, Hughes had become Nevada's largest private employer, largest casino owner, largest property owner and largest mining claims owner. Hughes' ventures also lead to the downfall of Attorney General John Mitchell, who is bribed not to file anti-trust action against Hughes' casino acquisitions. But more importantly to Las Vegans, Hughes' presence had put Las Vegas back in the country's good graces, making way for the city's corporate, mainstream era.

1977 - Clark County gaming revenues first crack $1 billion mark. The Nevada Legislature passes a foreign gaming law allowing Nevada-based casino owners to operate casinos outside Nevada's borders.

1980 - Clark County population hits 463,087 (Las Vegas- 164,674) as Las Vegas celebrates 75th birthday.

1989 - Mirage opens Nov. 22, with 3,039 rooms.

1993 - December 18: The mega-resort era comes to a head as the largest hotel in the world, Kirk Kerkorian's new MGM Grand Hotel & theme park, opens on the Las Vegas Strip. At a cost of $1 billion dollars, the hotel boasts a 33-acre theme park, a casino, 12 theme restaurants, 3 swimming pools, five tennis courts, arena, and 5,009 hotel rooms.

1994 - The first non-stop, regularly scheduled charter service from Europe begins with weekly flights by Condor from Cologne, Germany. County opens Interstate 15-McCarran airport connector road system that tunnels under the east-west runways. Brujah Aaron Nailer becomes a known associate of a small Anarch presence which is said to hide within the Giovanni stronghold 1995 - $25 million monorail begins running between MGM Grand and Bally's hotel-casinos on June 14. - Las Vegas reported a 29 million visitor volume for the year. Statewide gross gaming revenue surpasses $7.3 billion. Clark County produced $5.7 billion of the state's gaming revenue total. The original planned path of the monorail goes through an old Giovanni holding, the original site of the Twin Lakes project. After a large hold-up, and despite great expense, the monorail is constructed so as not to disturb the site. 1996 - Work is completed on the Desert Inn Road arterial, creating the first tunnel under the Las Vegas Strip.

1997 - Hilton Hotels Corp. makes a $10.5 billion hostile take-over move on Jan. 28 against ITT Corp. which resists the bid. ITT shareholders reject Hilton take-over in favor of a more lucrative offer by Starwood Lodging. The deal involves ownership of Caesars Place and The Desert Inn on the Las Vegas Strip.

1998 - Bellagio, billed as the most expensive hotel in the world ($1.7 billion) opens October 15 on the Las Vegas Strip and initiates a policy barring persons under 18 years of age who are not registered guests of the hotel. Brujah Elder Marcus Montgomery awakens from torpor, beneath the ground on a site nearby the construction project. 1999 - Japan Airlines adds a fourth nonstop flight per week in April from Tokyo to Las Vegas. Barbra Streisand, Bette Midler, Rod Stewart, Elton John, Tina Turner, Wayne Newton and Don Rickles are among the many entertainers booked by Las Vegas resorts to ring in the new century.

1999 - The Sabbat Up North In 1999, at a time before the tech or housing bubbles were bursting, when the President was just a womanizing adulterer and not an idiot, and most US troops overseas were hanging around Germany and South Korea not in extended warzones. Well, naturally at a time of such spectacular wealth creation and good feeling in the United States, the 'entertainment' industry in Las Vegas...offering its woman, drugs, and chance was steaming along with record profitability. Steve Wynn was making plans for what would become the super-casino of the future, and the once-king MGM Grand was being replaced by larger and more over the top projects each year with price tags making the one billion for The Grand seem paltry. Reno and Carson City sit approximately 30 miles from one another. The former, Las Vegas' predecessor...The original stopover for GIs, offering the same vice as Vegas without the glitz and thrill. Today, Reno was much the same, and as its depravity and despair seemed so right for the Sabbat. It was in this year that the fiends pushed over the gleaming tower which had sat there from before the early days of Hollywood and Nevada itself. Prince William 'Whip' Wilson, was forced to flee Reno as Sabbat forces flooded his town hailing from California and Arizona, as troubles with the Anarch Free State prevented the necessary aid arriving from Washington and Northern California. Prince Wilson and his court, after heavy casualties, retired to Carson City, long apart of Reno's court, now home to it, and where the Camarilla held a desperate grasp on the state's political and bureaucratic institutions. It was at this time that Archon Janet Buchanan first arrived in Nevada and the Tower began to take the emerging Sabbat threat there seriously.

2001 - Las Vegas Feels the Heat Of course, in the time since The Grand's construction, the new mega-success of Las Vegas and trend towards law and order nationally...well, such trends tend to be unfortunate for those in the organized crime business. Thus, even as the business institutions they controlled so thoroughly continued to grow the Giovanni were also finding new bureaucratic and political resistance. The police became more aggressive, and better at targeting the vampire interests within the city, and Giovanni strength was on the decline even without the dreadful march of kindred affairs towards Gehenna.

In the same year, and to the frustration of Fedele Massimo Giovanni, the city's Don since before the Italian crime family first dug into the dunes and helped build the strip, the north of the state was under assault by the Sabbat. Carson City and Reno had historically held Nevada's political apparatus. With the Camarilla's concern for the Masquerade and the interests of West Coast stability, Fedele and the Family had always benefited from Tower control of Nevada's capital. Reno having fallen a few years earlier, it was clear to the Necromancers, or any other onlooker, that the Camarilla's hold on Carson City could not last long without reinforcement.

By year's end, the city dubbed the Entertainment Capital of the World, saw the Sabbat making progress in its plans to control the entirety of the state. Even on Vegas' own doorstep, The Sword, ceased to confine its assaults to influence and intrigue and open warfare threatened the streets between The Black Hand and La Cosa Nostra.

2003 - Carson City Catastrophe Seneschal Rebecca Danvers was notably absent from the festivities on New Years Eve 2002. Although she was supposed to be the party's Hostess as she organized the event herself. A few hours in, on January 1, 2003 at midnight in the Carson City Ballroom, a massive explosion occurred annihilating the venue. Survivors were limited, with much of the court vaporized to dust in that instant. Over the course of the same evening, riots broke out all around town. The mayor and Assembly speaker were assassinated, and the proper Sabbat invasion of Carson City had begun. By the end of the evening, the only known surviving kindred was the Prince himself.

The other survivors were, by and large, neonates and ancillae of lesser consequence. The Prince and the remaining kindred in town were able to defend the city's institutions for some months. Even after a conclave, the tide turned quickly especially with the refusal of help from Prince Edward Sheffeild of Sunrise Gardens, a member of the Conclave who seemed to do nearly all he could to prevent any resources being drawn from elsewhere to Carson City's court. Despite Archon Buchannan and Prince Wilson's impassioned pleas for the Capital no help would come from the tower. It was at this time, that Buchannan reached elsewhere, towards Las Vegas and the Necromancers.

2004 - Strange Bedfellows It was in 2004 that a sitdown occurred between Giovanni Fedele Massimoi; Malkavian: Perry Goldstein, Brujah: Marcus Montgomery, Aaron Nailer, his childe Alejandra Nachios, and Tremere Regent Meyer Roth. And so, the Archon and Camarilla denizens of the city sat down with its Don and struck an agreement that would change Las Vegas forever. In the months that followed, Carson City was surrendered...The Camarilla evacuated, many moving to find a new home in Las Vegas. No court was set up in these early nights, though a war-court was maintained under the control of Archon Janet Buchannan and based between the Monte Carlo Hotel and Casino and the longstanding Tremere Chantry. Prince Wilson did not move along with his court however, and none have heard from him or his Seneschal since.

2005 -> 2007 - War! The now jointly-controlled city of Las Vegas braced itself for the inevitable onslaught that would follow in the wake of Carson City's demise. By sheer luck, the evacuation process had gone smoothly and without too many needless soldiers of The Tower lost to the Sabbat, the combined forces of The Giovanni and remaining Camarilla of Reno and Carson City, stood as a formidable force against the barbarians at the gate. Credible deterrent or no, the Sabbat still came to The Strip. The primary defenders of the city were, of course, The Giovanni under the direction of their Don. The Camarilla forces, early on, were only the ragtag remains of Carson City. A group abandoned even by its own Prince. The Archon did everything that she could to rally these forces, but the true fighting not done by the Italians was done by the Brujah and the Anarchs. Though over time, the Archon was able to procure aid from the Tower and enough support to leave a strong Camarilla population in town, without counting the Anarchs or Camarilla loyal to Aaron Nailer. Nailer's support was required was his rather cozy relationship to the Anarch forces as well as his high status among clan Brujah. Truly, he was a creature who walked in many worlds and a great leader admired by the old warhorses and soldiers all three united factions. He was also a power kindred, and side by side with his childe, led the more physical confrontations while leaving the subtleties to the Archon and the Don. Nailer did not survive, however, meeting his own end at the hands of a Lasombra Archbishop. Though this nearly scattered the Brujah/Anarch alliance, Nailer's childe Alejandra as well as the Brujah elder Marcus Montgomerykept the remaining rabble in line. The young and heroic Alejandra did not work well with the cold and calculating elder, but to keep the war-forces of Las Vegas intact, compromise prevailed time and again.

2007 - The Princeling Eventually, despite the difficulty of maintaining unity, and the challenge of Sabbat control over Carson City, Las Vegas beat back the Sabbat to retire to its recent acquisitions to the North. This, of course, left Las Vegas looking like post-WW II Berlin. The Giovanni on one side, Brujah, Anarchs, and the remaining Camarilla on the other. These latter groups had to organize quickly, and the question of Prince was an earnest one. Archon Buchanan was forced to leave town quickly, not staying for these organizational matters. This, of course, left the Brujah and Tremere elders Marcus and Meyer battling over the spot. In the end, it was Alejandra Nachios who ended the stalemate. How, remains a rather hot question in town, but after calling the two together for a meeting, Alejandra departed as the elders announced in the Monte Carlo ballroom that the little known Brujah Cecilia Gambino, young and recently arrived but having gotten her hands' dirty in the war, would stand as Prince of Las Vegas.