The death of Nevada banking powerhouse E. Parry Thomas this past week was accompanied by fitting tributes from some of the Las Vegans whose careers were shaped by his investment acumen.
But not even casino baron Steve Wynn, for all his oratorical gifts, was capable of fully capturing Thomas’s importance to the creation of the new Las Vegas. Thomas played an integral role in Wynn’s life and business development, but that was just a small part of the banker’s legacy and legend.
The fact is, Thomas and Valley Bank had a hand in the development of Las Vegas at just about every level. The magic he worked early in Wynn’s career has been well-chronicled, but Thomas approved loans for a generation of other players great and small. Colorful casino character Bob Stupak’s Vegas World, for instance, was essentially saved by a Valley Bank loan.
But it’s not the casino kings and gambling court jesters whom Thomas helped make wealthy that I find remarkable. What’s truly amazing is that Thomas managed to navigate some of the most treacherous waters in the history of American finance without appearing to break a sweat.
Sent by Mormon bankers in 1954 from Salt Lake City to Las Vegas to operate the Bank of Las Vegas, Thomas seemed to immediately appreciate the, let’s say, uniqueness of the town’s business climate. He began making loans to casino men, some of whom had unsavory reputations. In partnership with banking investor Jerome “Jerry” Mack, Thomas helped enable unprecedented growth in the valley, from the Strip to newly constructed neighborhoods that were then far out on the edge of town.
“Thomas and Mack went on to erect a banking and land empire, and their philanthropy contributed to the rise of the local United Way and university,” historian Michael S. Green writes in “Nevada: A History of the Silver State,” “But, for their trouble, they faced allegations of ties to the Mob.”
Given their clientele, it would have been surprising to expect otherwise.
In “Quiet Kingmaker of Las Vegas,” Thomas recalled to his biographer Jack Sheehan, “Jerry and I were really closer than brothers could be because of the mutual trust between us. We had so much confidence in what we were doing, maybe it was just the confidence of youth, but we were going to do it well.”
The early years weren’t without their tense moments.
“In those first years, I would say that ninety percent of the gaming loans we made were to existing establishments that had, in my opinion, proven themselves,” Thomas said. “I was scared of start-up operations.”
In time Thomas would be blamed for helping the mob to slip behind a corporate veil and lauded for helping create the corporate gaming model that eventually pushed the mob from Nevada casinos.
Thomas was akin to royalty in Las Vegas, where his reputation was brighter than neon. But he occasionally faced substantial heat from federal law enforcement.
Thomas smoothed the secretive casino-buying spree of Howard Hughes in the late 1960s. By the early ‘70s the eccentric billionaire was gone and federal investigators were asking tough questions after concluding the gambling holdings “had been heavily skimmed by employees and that he had paid highly inflated prices for his hotels and real estate purchases, many of which had been orchestrated by E. Parry Thomas,” Ovid Demaris wrote in “The Boardwalk Jungle.” “… Federal investigators wanted to know whether the money had been funneled into the hands of the underworld.”
Thomas bristled at the inquiry and replied somewhat cryptically, “I’ve never met a hoodlum, not knowingly, anyway.”
Many years later, Thomas maintained his view that, “There are two sides to the issue of the Mob’s role in building Las Vegas. In my viewpoint, I don’t think they were builders at all.”
Through the years, Thomas survived the shadows cast by some of his clients, outlived the highly suspicious financing of the mobbed-up Dunes, and survived an investigation into the Continental Connector Corporation. Through it all, Valley Bank continued to expand and prosper.
To some, Thomas was the “hoodlum banker.” To many Las Vegans, he was a founding father with sage advice and a checkbook. His death Friday at age 95 in Hailey, Idaho, with his wife and children at his side, is a reminder that the banking titan was also a devoted family man.
As it rattles and hums toward the future, Las Vegas owes a debt of gratitude to the “quiet kingmaker” that’s impossible to repay.
John L. Smith is a longtime Las Vegas journalist and the author of many books, including “Running Scared: The Life and Treacherous Times of Las Vegas Casino King Steve Wynn.”
