"I just lucked into things. I used to think that if I made $50,000 I'd be the happiest guy in the world."
Kerkorian's personal memories could fill dozens of books. Yet, being a Gemini (like Donald Trump) his basic character trait is
to always be involved in something new and not spend too much time looking back. This future-thinking trait is good for the
advancement of Las Vegas - but its a shame we can't hear him talk about his life experiences a little more. History will just
have to go without his input, since he is a very quick and busy man. Sort of an non-aging Dorian Grey. What other 93 year old
man, in this current age or any other, can keep going so strong? Since Kirk isn't about to tell his story - I've taken it upon
myself to present a few parts of his tale (in the hopes that someone more capable than me might eventually write a better one).
Kirk's pace has always been almost super-human, from his early boxing days - to his days competing with Howard Hughes
(just 11 years his senior) to Kirk's involvements with Steve Wynn (24 years his junior) which continue to this day.
Yes. Kirk Kerkorian's life story is a king-sized tale which we most likely will never know, except thru small
bits and pieces. This bio presents a different perspective than the norm. Most Kerkorian biographies miss the grade entirely.
This bio will be no better - so why rely on half-facts in trying to tell it? I won't waste time trying. I only intend to show things from
another angle. Its important to see the connections between Kirk and Wynn - since both are the masters of casino development.
Kirk's biographers rarely get the facts right on Kirk. They say he dropped out of school in the eighth grade.
Perhaps that makes his story more interesting by implying that Kirk was an impoverished, junior-high school drop-out.
Yet, my 84 year old mother, who lived just 8 houses away from young Kirk's home (on Ventura Avenue in Fresno's small
Armenian Town) remembers how her and her sisters would watch Kirk on his daily walks to Fresno-Tech High-School. She
also remembers that he attended Fresno State College for awhile (just before he opened Fresno's first automated car-wash).
Armenians, by nature, are very curious people. Especially teen-aged, Armenian girls. So, when my mom describes Kirk walking
to high-school...always at 80 miles an hour... in a variety of brand-new ski-sweaters...and never even giving her or her sisters
a second glance ...I tend to believe her. Especially when she says her red-head sister Queenie used to try flirting with Kirk at
Sooren's Peda Bread Bakery, but he never paid any attention at all...I tend to belive that too...because there is no self-favoring
embellishment or desire to stretch the truth in the answers she gives to the questions I ask her.
When my mother tells me how Kirk's mother and my grandmother walked to the Holy Trinity church together and visited each other's
homes to roll grape-leaves into Armenian Sarma, knead dough into Lahmajoon (Armenian Pizzas) and drink Turkish coffee together to
read the fortune-telling patterns in the sediment left at cup's bottom....I believe that also. Armenians may gossip, but they rarely lie.
And even when my mom says that Kirk went steady with the girl at the dry-cleaner's shop... just beyond Black's Grocery...right next
door to Duke's Bar...across from California Hotel on Inyo...where the four Hagopian Brothers, who owned the 'The Swing Club'
dance-hall on Broadway used to hang out...along with almost every other young Armenian guy in the neighborhood...and that Kirk
later married the pretty dry-cleaner-girl named Eva (even though that early marriage isn't listed in any of Kirk's bios)...well,
I still sort of believe that some parts of her recollections might be half-true (though maybe distorted a bit by the fog of time).
She's easy to believe, because she includes 'telling' details of her Fresno memories...like when she says that 'Junior Touch Ohanian'
(later Mike Conners of Mannix TV fame) wore a deep-blue cashmiere sweater and was actually the handsomest guy on the block...and
had a beautiful sister...and their father was a lawyer...but not richer than the other neighbors...and definitely not as mean and rude as
Johnnie Sarkisian (Cher's dad) who used to push her off the swing-set at Emerson Elementary and tease her outside Arax' Market.
Armenians remember the smallest details of the people around them. It's sort of a learned cultural trait. They ask a lot of questions.
"What happened?". "What did you see?". What did it look like?". "How'd they act?". "What did he say?". Those are the type of things
Armenians always ask each other. They tend to look at everything thru a microscope and keep their eyes wide-open and analyze things.
They have a strong need-to-know. It's a sort of national trait. And can sometimes seem like a miniature inquisition. So. When my
mother gives me one of her highly detailed responses....I usually believe that 75% of them could actually be true. 50% of the time.
Armenia was the first country to adopt Christianity as their state's religion (which they did in the 3rd century AD).
Living on the fertile land surrounding Mount Ararat (the supposed landing spot of Noah's Ark) they lived a life
of high civility and refinement, unmatched among other areas of Persia, further south. With kind and peaceful
natures a part of their national training and evolution, their peacefulness drew forth the wrath of their barbaric
Turkish neighbors - who decided to kick all the Armenians off of their own ancient homeland and claim it
for themselves. They did this thru acts of barbarism, extreme cruelty, rapes, slaughters and starvations.
By 1915, within just 18 months, over 1.5 million Armenians were killed and the rest forced to evacuate.
Which they did by moving to Europe & the Mid-East or by, preferably, catching a refugee boat to the
USA - provided by the compassionate assistance of many caring, English missionaries.
Upon their arrival in California, the escaped Armenians were determined to not look backwards. Although they
would hold firmly onto their cultural heritage and beliefs, the 'escapees' were just as determined to establish
their future solidly in the new land. The first-born American sons and daughters of the Armenian immigrants
were motivated to escape from the stigma of being immigrants - especially wanting to no longer be labeled as
a "poor Armenian" or even worse a "Dee-Pee" (Displaced Person).
Dee-Pee was the slang word used to describe the pitiful looking race of people who arrived in America wearing rags,
with little available support from established American relatives. Unlike the German, Irish or Italian immigrants who
arrived, in spurts, in the U.S. decades earlier (usually having some form of employment pre-arranged by relatives)
the Armenians arrived all at once, in a large exodus of displacement...with no established help available for them.
This is the big distinction that Armenians held. They were the unfortunate members of a race of displaced refugees.
DP, being the shortened version of the Ellis Island term for 'displaced person', had the same meaning used decades
earlier for the Italian immigrants who were labeled as "Wops"...the initials used at the immigration port for Italians who
were labled as W.O.P (With Out Papers). Regardless of the innocent origin of the slang word, the derogatory use
of the term DP, held a harsh meaning for young Armenians who wanted to fit into a society that didn't want them.
"Un-wanted" definitely applied to the American-born Armenians who were coming of age after the 1929 Depression.
The stigma of being 'the dark haired people' in a land filled mainly with blond and brown haired Anglo-Saxons, was
felt strongly. In 1920s' Fresno, Armenians were stuck with the derogatory name of 'Fresno Indians'. Armenian children
were kept segregated to certain schools. In early Fresno this meant Armenians could only attend Emerson Elementary,
Longfellow Junior High, or Fresno Tech High School. Armenians weren't allowed into the prosperous district of
Fresno High School for over two decades after they arrived. So, when it comes to understanding the motivations
of a 13 year old like Kirk Kerkorian (or any member of that first-born generation of Armenian-Americans)
it definitely helps to consider the differences between early 1930s society and what we have now.
When people wonder why Kirk Kerkorian or author William Saroyan are so revered among Armenians it is
because these two men proved to the world that Armenians were capable of modern intellect and business sense.
When Armenians first settled in Fresno, after their 1915 exodus, they took up residence in a specific, low-income,
ethnic section of Fresno that was located nearer to the downtown area than the Anglo-Saxon neighborhoods.
The section where Armenians lived was an enclave known as Little Armenia or Armenian Town.
There were other ethnic neighborhoods known as German Town, Little Italy, and China Town, but Armenian Town
was unique for being located just on the edge of the downtown area between the Sante Fe and Southern Pacific
railroad terminals. In many ways this segregated area would prove helpful to the Armenians by allowing them
to be close to the 'high-action area' filled with commerce, assorted train travelers and the major hotels.
The neighborhood of Little Armenia was filled with early row-house-cottages in the Ventura Street area. The house
(seen above) is still located on the same block where Kerkorian's family lived and is a perfect example of the
life-style of Armenian Town from 1916-1946. This is the exact same six-block area that William Saroyan
(9 years Kirk's senior) grew up in and wrote about in 'My Name is Aram' and 'The Human Comedy'.
Saroyan was the first Fresno-Armenian to achieve national fame. A fact integral to the motivations of
Kirk Kerkorian in his roles as World War Two airplane pilot and future Las Vegas hotel-mogul.
Following World War Two, the Armenian population of Fresno began spreading into other areas of town.
In the 1960s, most of Little Armenia was razed to make way for the Convention Center and freeway on-ramps.
The Sun-Maid Raisin Factory was where dried grapes where processed by the California Associated Raisin
Company. The company was founded in 1912 as a cooperative of family farms located within 150 miles of
Fresno. The factory was located 9 blocks from Kirk's home and was Fresno's largest employer of Armenians.
The Fresno Republican Newspaper (blue-dot, mid-right) was located two blocks from where Kirk lived
and it was as a news-boy, selling papers at the major hotels, where he got his first taste of hotel-commerce.
The Sequoia Hotel was located directly across the street from the Fresno Republican Newspaper
where Kerkorian would pick up his batch of morning-papers to sell to guests at the Fresno Hotels.
William Saroyan had worked at the Republican (both as newsboy and copy-checker) a decade earlier.
Any kid (especially a paper-boy in the late 1920s and early 1930s) would certainly get a huge look at the
glamorous world of big hotels, VIPS, city-action and big-time-entertainment...plus know the feeling of
accumulating nickels, dimes and dollars by understanding how to properly sell to travelers.
In 1932, the famous hotel-man Tom Hull, took over the operations of the Hotel Californian. Hull (born 1897)
had lots of experience in the hotel industry, having operated the Hollywood Roosevelt, the Mayfair and
Hollywood Plaza hotels in Los Angeles - as well the Hotel Senator in Sacramento.
In 1939 Hull opened the El Rancho Fresno and El Rancho Sacramento motels as 'car oriented architecture'
meant to lure highway travelers in for a rest from their highway travels. Hull later opened El Rancho Motels in
Bakersfield and Indo. In 1941 he extended his El Rancho chain to include Las Vegas in his string of hotels.
Hull's success in the hotel business was something obviously well noted by Kirk Kerkorian who spent many
years nearly living in the shadow of the Hotel Californian, as a boy and young man.
Being a part of the commerce at these early hotels in the exciting pre-WW2 Downtown Fresno environment
shaped Kerkorian's love for the hotel industry. His formative years were spent with the full awareness that
traveling guests at the major hotels had particular tastes and needs as well as pockets full of dimes.
Just as Steve Wynn grew up involved in the every-day-operations of the gaming business, Kirk likewise spent his
earliest days learning about hotels. Even Kirk's later involvement with investing in the auto-industry had roots
that go back to his early twenties when he developed a unique steam-cleaning business to clean car motors
for used car dealers and his later opening of the first automated car-wash in Fresno (a short-lived
business interrupted by Kirk's enlistment in the WW2 air-force).
'Human Comedy' (a fictionalized story about life in the WW2 homefront of Fresno) was made into a movie in 1943.
It won the Oscar for Best Story & was nominated for Best Actor, Director & Picture. A big deal for Fresnan's.
Older Armenian Fresno men (like my Grandpa and Saroyan) kept close track of the World War Two exploits of the
younger Kirk Kerkorian, whose War-Hero status gave much pride to the members of the small Armenian neighborhood.
This 1962 view shows one of Kirk's earliest Las Vegas investments in Las Vegas. He purchased the land across from
The Flamingo Hotel (seen on left with billboards). This land would later be leased to Jay Sarno for Caesars Palace.
The original 1946 Flamingo had been remodeled in 1953 - when its Champagne Tower was added. During Kirk's
1967 remodeling of the hotel the 17 year old Champagne Tower was demolished to make way for a new covered
driveway (porte cochere) and an 'observartion-styled' restaurant. The large windows of the 2nd floor restaurant
provided patrons with a fantastic view of the new Caesars Palace fountains and hotel across the street.
The reason for Kirk's purchase of the Flamingo and Bonanza was supposedly so that Kirkorian could train employees
for his next big plan to build the World's Largest Hotel on Paradise Road, which some people thought had the potential
to become a New Strip. While Kirk was buying the Bonanza he was also making plans to open his International.
While Kerkorian was building his International, Howard Hughes was also completing work to get the (long-stalled)
Landmark Hotel-Casino opened across the road from the International. They would both open just two days apart.
In 1969 Kirk also purchased the entire MGM film studio in Los Angeles and owned most of the land that would
later be called Century City. In 1972 Kirk would turn his new vacant Las Vegas lot into the MGM Grand Hotel.
In 1977 most Strip casinos had plenty of parking lots located in front of their hotels. The little motel
(on left side) would become the Barbary Coast in 1978. Drai's Restaurant is currently located there also.
Compare the size of this motel (left of MGM) and the former Bonanza Motel-Casino (right of MGM) to the size of
the building that Kerkorian built. Kirk's original MGM Grand was felt to be huge in the landscape of 1970s Vegas.
In 2000, just two years after Wynn opened his Bellagio hotel, Kirk made him an offer too good to pass-up
and purchased the entire block of Wynn Hotels (Mirage, Treasure Island and Bellagio). With that money,
Wynn was able to purchase the Desert Inn property and turn it into Wynn Las Vegas and Encore.
In 2006 Kirk began building his newest Las Vegas development, the City Center project - taking Las Vegas
into an entire new realm. His skyscraper filled mini-city may send the city into a whole new direction.
Vegas casinos owners have played the game of one-ups-manship since the 1930s. It's plain to see that
Kerkorian and Wynn have long motivated each other thru this friendly-competion that's been going on
since Wynn first arrived in Las Vegas and bought his first piece of Strip property next to Caesars.
Today is Kirk's 93rd Birthday. Maybe he can take a day-off to just enjoy his amazing
longevity...his biggest achievement of all, in my opinion. Happy Birthday Super K.
When the hotel opened on December 17, 1993 it had 5,005 hotel rooms and became the third World's Largest
Hotel that Kirk had opened. In 2009, Kirk Kerkorian and partners opened the largest privately funded
real estate development in North America - called City Center Las Vegas.
®
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