Thursday, February 17, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Dice clock a time-honored Las Vegas memento

The dice clock continues to attract tourists.

The dice clock, that square time-keeping piece of craps kitsch, serves as the perennial Las Vegas souvenir, local workplace gag gift and badge of honor for the unlucky gambler.

They're as timeless as the T-shirts that proclaim "I Lost My Ass in Vegas," and as much a part of the fabric of Sin City as topless bars, long-hauling cabbys and a martini-swilling mayor. But who came up with the idea of gluing dice to a clock then selling it to people?

We put that question to a few experts on all things Las Vegas, and, surprisingly, stumped nearly every one.

"I moved here in 1967, and they had them then. They were everywhere. They're probably the same ones as today," joked local Barney Vincent, author of seven books about Las Vegas, including the upcoming "Casino Secrets" from Huntington Press.

Vincent has a theory about why visitors buy the clocks, but he couldn't say who first created them.

"Friends say `Bring me back a (Las Vegas) souvenir.' Nobody really wants a dice clock. Nobody wants a T-shirt. They want money, but they know you're not going to give them that, so a dice clock will do just fine," Vincent explained. "It's just something that's got that Vegas flavor to it."

Exactly who came up with the souvenirs first is a "bone of contention between two old-timers," said Lynn Morris, buyer and owner of Bonanza Gift Shop.

Former Las Vegas city councilman Steve Miller claims his father, Hal Miller, was the first to come up with dice clocks in the late 1960s, said Morris, whose father ran a local gift shop during the 1950s. The real creator was probably Reve White, a stand-up comic and musician who died in 1995.

Some people find the dispute humorous while others, such as George Harris, owner of Shooting Star Souvenirs, take it a little personally.

"This would be great to lay this story to rest. Steve Miller takes credit for it, but it was Reve (White)," Harris insisted. "I've been in this business since I was 11 years old, worked in souvenir shops my whole life, so historically I know (the truth)."

The story goes, Harris said, that White put one together as a joke for a mid-level gambler at the Sahara. Others saw it, asked for one of their own and the rest is history.

What's more likely is that both men created their own clocks independent of each other around the same time, the late 1960s. Years ago, souvenir shops would make their own merchandise and sell it in the store, Morris explained.

But, when people buy them, the last thing on their minds is who created them, said Angie Hurt, assistant manager of Bonanza Gifts.