The Mysterious Death of a Tenor Man (continued)

Las Vegas is usually thought of as a wild kind of place where "anything goes." Most people are surprised to learn that, in terms of race relations, the city has a history much like any Southern town; in fact, Vegas was known as the "Missisipi of the West". Segregation was widespread and enforced by laws that cut blacks out of any reasonable representation. Blacks were not allowed to use city swimming pools and could only purchase cemetary plots in carefully delineated "black" burial areas. Interracial marriage licenses were not granted, and any black citizen requesting such a license with the intention of marrying a white was arrested. The first marriage license granted to an interracial couple in Las Vegas was not issued until 1959.

The same was true of the downtown casinos and the Strip. Blacks were not allowed in the casinos to gamble and were usually not allowed to stay at the hotels and establishments on the Strip where they performed. Bugsy Siegel was the first to hire black performers to entertain at his establishment, the Flamingo, because he wanted the best performers regardless of their race. Lena Horne performed there shortly after the Flamingo opened, but she was not allowed to enter the casino. While she was able to stay at the Flamingo during her tenure there, many performers were not so lucky. Generally the black bands, singers, and comedians who performed downtown had to stay in the area known as the Westside, an area on the west side of the railroad tracks where blacks and their businesses were pretty much kept "hidden" from the rest of the town. Any establishment that would attract a "mixed clientele" (a euphemism for having black customers) was denied a business license unless it was located on the Westside.

In 1955, the Moulin Rouge casino opened at 900 West Bonanza Road. The casino had a clear policy of serving any and all patrons, regardless of race. Because of its open policy, it was able to draw many of the top black entertainers in the country. Black entertainers who performed on the Strip would stay at the Moulin Rouge, and many white entertainers came there to relax and have a good time after their shows. Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., and Ed Sullivan were all frequent visitors to the Moulin Rouge's gaming floor. The Moulin Rouge had a "third show", unlike the Strip casinos which only had a dinner show and a midnight show. This led to an "after-hours" atmosphere at the Moulin Rouge, similar to the jam session atmosphere at integrated jazz clubs in New York or Los Angeles. Nor was the casino merely a front for white businessmen--the management, dealers, and other workers at the Moulin Rouge were all black, a very radical concept a that time not only for Las Vegas, but large parts of the United States.

Benny Carter's band played at the Moulin Rouge's opening, and two days later Wardell Gray was dead. What happened? There have been several theories advanced over the years. The commonly accepted story, boosted by the official cause of death report, is that Gray had succumbed to the lure of heroin and either overdosed, resulting in his body being dumped in the desert to keep the Moulin Rouge from being implicated, or that he had been involved in a drug deal that went bad. While Gray's sermons against drug use to younger musicians and the testimony of many collegues that Gray was a lifelong non-user don't disprove this, they certainly make it seem somewhat unlikely. So does the apparent unwillingness of Las Vegas law enforcement at the time to entertain any other theories.

Other people who knew Wardell swear that he was murdered because of a gambling debt. Given the nature of Las Vegas and its business, this not outside the realm of possibility. Still another possibility is that Wardell Gray was the victim of a racially motivated murder. Remember that an interracial marriage license wasn't granted in Vegas for four years after this incident. Despite the success of the Moulin Rouge, black citizens of Las Vegas were still mostly confined to the Westside and there were sometimes eruptions of civil unrest. Whether Gray somehow provoked a racist individual or group by his mere presence or was in the wrong place at the wrong time, it does not stretch the imagination too much to see how something like this could have happened.

Another fact that lends an air of suspicion to events surrounding Gray's death is the fact that the Moulin Rouge closed after only six months of operation, despite great popularity. Again, there are many theories as to why, ranging from poor business management to pressure from the casinos on the Strip, who felt that the Moulin Rouge was too popular and was competing with their business. Whatever the reason, it seems clear that there were events in both the closing of the Moulin Rouge and the death of Wardell Gray that have not, and may never, come to light.