Jackpot: Born the Day Idaho Banned Gambling

Jackpot, Nevada exists because Idaho made a decision in nineteen fifty-four. That year the state of Idaho outlawed casino gambling, and two slot machine operators named Cactus Pete Piersanti and Don French promptly moved their machines across the state line to the first patch of Nevada desert they could find. Their establishments, Cactus Pete's and the Horseshu Club, sat right on US Ninety-Three, less than a mile from the Idaho border.

The county commissioners struggled to name the unincorporated settlement. It went by Horse Shu, then Unincorporated Town Number One, before the casino owners compromised on Jackpot in nineteen fifty-nine. A town built entirely on one state's moral objection to gambling, Jackpot has no reason to exist except geography and the Nevada Gaming Control Board.