History in a Man

Our incognito casino worker sees the old days in his aging colleague

Jon Livorno

He is too old to understand cell phones, computers, or the Internet, and has forgotten even the most basic duties required of his job. Memos and notices of his errors pile up on the left corner of his desk. When they start to teeter, he pushes them into the trash can. Though the casino has certain quotas to meet, those in charge don't have the heart to fire John Allen. To do so would be like setting fire to the whole history of Las Vegas.


Allen moved to Las Vegas at age 22, shortly after the end of World War II. He took a job as a blackjack dealer; he was able to work his way up the ranks and befriend all the old heroes and antiheroes affiliated with vintage Las Vegas.


More than a man, to those of us working in the casino, Allen is a living, breathing history book of this city's past. If the mood suits him, he sometimes tells old mob stories. He talks of bodies buried in the desert, and of the classy men and women who once floated through the casinos like angels and demons. You can see his contempt for the amusement-park theme of the newer casinos, and his annoyance with couples in tank tops and backwards baseball caps pushing crying babies in strollers. "Sacrilegious," he says of them.


He has been married to Las Vegas for over 50 years, and to his wife for 40. She passed away a few years ago. He could have retired, but still he shows up every night.


We've come to the consensus that his wife's absence is what drives him to work. The casino life is all he has ever known; possibly the only corporeal thing he still loves.


To fend off the possibility of disappointing customers, he deals only with his old clientele. Most of them are elderly Italian men like himself. Most are self-evident ex-mafia that swagger and stare down everyone around them. Their contact information is not listed in the computer, and their banking info shows millions of dollars spread over several accounts.


John Allen has his millions, too. He lives in a neighborhood with famous actors and sports personalities. He owns three luxury cars, two of them just for the hell of it. None of that seems to matter now, since his wife has passed away. He still comes to work five nights a week, but he sits at his desk like an unplugged toaster. Sometimes he does not respond when a customer begins speaking to him. He sleepwalks through the nights when none of the old clientele is in town.


But one situation brings him to life more than anything else: When players start making demands after getting drunk and pissing away thousands of dollars. They push for more than they've earned, and berate the pit bosses and dealers who they think won't retaliate out of fear of being sued. These situations jolt Allen back to life like the Kraken being released from its cage in the film Clash of the Titans. His eyes glow like slot machines hitting jackpot. He coils his fists and shouts with the ferocity of a war veteran whose honor has been questioned. Like his ex-mafia clientele, he flashes dangerous eyes as he puffs out his chest into an impenetrable shield.


For us younger guys, it's enthralling to watch the player retreat, complying with John's command to get the hell out of his casino. He guards the craps table like a fiercely loyal dog until the player is out of sight. He sometimes stands with his nails dug into the wooden chip racks for a good five minutes, staring hatefully at nothing. This is how it went in the old days, and it is what he knows.


Then he slowly becomes the withered John again; his vibrant eyes fade into thin slivers of old age. He waddles back to his desk, becomes the unplugged toaster, and fixes on a patch of air to stare at. He looks like a man who has seen too much of the world. He looks like a man impetuously waiting to rejoin the woman he loves.

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