John Wisner originally bought the property on the corner of Main and Fremont where the Las Vegas Club now stands, at a 1905 land auction for $1,750 and built the Overland Hotel. In 1911 the Overland burnt to the ground and was rebuilt on the same location. The Overland briefly became Frank Donovan's Chatterbox Club and Talk of the Town Bar. The Las Vegas Club opened in 1930. The owner was J. Kell Houssels who installed the first neon sign on a hotel gambling establishment in 1931. It was only the second neon casino sign in the city. The Las Vegas Club was originally on the south side of Fremont Street, at 21-23 Fremont, midway between Main and 1st Street. It was right next to the Northern Club casino, which became the La Bayou casino. In 1949, J. Kell Houssels Sr. owner of the Las Vegas Club moved it across the street to 18 Fremont street, the site of the Overland Hotel, eventually expanding to its present location at the corner of Fremont and Main. Houssels then erected the famous Las Vegas Club sign on site, the tallest sign in town. The Overland Hotel continued to operate above the Club. In 1961, Jackie Gaughan, Mel Exber and Larry Hazzlewood bought the Las Vegas Club and Houssels became majority shareholder in the Tropicana.
21st century
On December 6, 2002, owner Jackie Gaughan agreed to sell the Las Vegas Club and three other casinos, including the Plaza casino and Gold Spike casino, to Barrick Gaming. Barrick was in partnership with the Tamares Group. January 2007 saw the opening of a new poker room in the casino. In March 2007, Tamares announced that it was considering converting the property into a high-rise condo-hotel. This failed to happen, and in April 2013, the Las Vegas Club closed its hotel tower, leaving the casino open. The possibility of a future renovation of the hotel was hinted at, but never occurred. In May 2015, the Las Vegas Club announced its intent to open a 13,810-square-foot pharmacy on the eastern side of its casino. Those plans changed, in light of the August 14, 2015, announcement of the casino's sale to Derek and Greg Stevens, owners of the nearby D and Golden Gate casinos.
Circa Las Vegas
After the sale, The Las Vegas Club closed at midnight on August 19, 2015. The building along with the former Mermaids Casino and Glitter Gulch strip club were demolished over the course of 2017 to make way for a new resort expected to open in 2020. In a presentation given by Derek Stevens in January 2019, the name of the resort was announced as Circa Las Vegas. The new resort will have a 44-story hotel tower, 777 hotel rooms, many of them suites; a multi-tiered pool amphitheater with a 125-foot high resolutionvideo screen; a split-level casino floor and a 1,201-space parking garage.
