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Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel ( February 28 , 1906 – June 20 , 1947 ) was an American Gangster , popularly thought to be the impetus behind large-scale development of Las Vegas . He hated the Nickname , Bugsy (said to be based on the Slang term "bugs", meaning "crazy", and used to describe his sometimes erratic behavior), and wouldn't allow anyone to call him that to his face. THE BEGINNING Benjamin Hymen Siegelbaum was born in Brooklyn, New York , to a poor Austrian Jewish family, one of five children. As a boy, Siegel joined a street gang on Lafayette Street in the Lower East Side and committed first mainly Theft s, until, with another youth named Moe Sedway, he devised his own Protection Racket ; he forced pushcart merchants to pay him five dollars or he would incinerate their merchandise on the spot. During adolescence, Siegel befriended Meyer Lansky , forming a small gang with him that expanded to Gambling and Car Theft . Siegel reputedly also worked as the gang's Hit Man whom Lansky would sometimes hire out to other gang bosses. In 1926 Siegel was arrested for raping a woman who had turned down his advances in a Speakeasy , but Lansky coerced the victim not to testify against Siegel. In 1930 Lansky and Siegel joined forces with Charles "Lucky" Luciano . Siegel became a Bootlegger and was also associated with Albert Anastasia . Siegel was used for bootlegging operations in New York , New Jersey and Philadelphia . During the so-called Castellammarese War in 1930-1931, they fought the gang of Joe Masseria ; Siegel reputedly had a hand in Masseria's 1931 murder in Coney Island and later had a part in the formation of Murder, Inc. In 1932 he was arrested for gambling and bootlegging but got away with a fine. Lansky and Siegel were briefly allied with Dutch Schultz and killed rival Loan Shark s Louis and Joseph Amberg in 1935 . TO CALIFORNIA In 1937 the East Coast mob sent Siegel to California to try to develop Syndicate gambling rackets in the West alongside Los Angeles mobster Jack Dragna . Siegel also recruited Jewish gang boss Mickey Cohen as his lieutenant. Siegel used Syndicate money to set up a national wire service to help the East Coast mob get their cut faster. Siegel married his childhood sweetheart Esta Krakow, sister of hit man Whitey Krakow , on January 28 , 1939 . He eventually moved her and their two daughters to the West Coast, after his bosses had sent him there, but kept them in the dark about his many extramarital affairs. Siegel had a number of mistresses, including actresses Ketti Gallian , Wendy Barrie and Marie "the Body" MacDonald , and Hollywood socialite Dorothy DiFrasso . With the aid of DiFrasso and actor friend George Raft , Siegel gained entry into Hollywood's inner circle. He is alleged to have used his contacts to extort movie studios. He lived in extravagant fashion, as befitting his reputation. On his tax returns, Siegel claimed to earn a living through legal gambling at the Santa Anita racetrack near Los Angeles . Siegel became enamored with a sharp-tongued Moll and courier, Virginia Hill . They began a torrid affair. Hill helped Siegel establish contacts in Mexico . The Alabama -born Hill was wealthy in her own right and had bought a mansion in Beverly Hills from Metropolitan Opera Baritone Lawrence Tibbett , where Siegel frequently stayed. Hill became Siegel's paramour. Later, there were rumors that they had secretly married in Mexico. Their affair, however, did not keep Siegel from continuing his compulsive womanizing. Hill's reaction to Siegel's infidelities is unknown, but the long-suffering Esta finally reached her limit; she went to Reno and obtained a divorce in 1946 . On November 22 , 1939 , Siegel, with his brother-in-law Whitey Krakow and two others, killed Harry Greenberg , who had become a police Informant , on the orders of Murder, Inc. boss Lepke Buchalter . Siegel was arrested and tried for the murder (by that time, he had also killed Krakow). He was acquitted, but newspapers referred to him for the first time by his nickname "Bugsy." Siegel was not pleased, especially when his gangland past was revealed. On one return trip to the East, Siegel drove through the small town of Las Vegas, Nevada . Legend has it that Siegel suddenly had a vision of turning Las Vegas into a gambling mecca. Others said he had merely stopped there for a call of nature. LAS VEGAS VENTURE According to popular myth, Bugsy envisioned building a large casino and hotel to which gamblers would flock. His vision was fueled by the fact that Nevada had legalized gambling in 1931 . In Las Vegas, gambling was concentrated in downtown casinos along Fremont Street, whose clientele largely consisted of members of the construction crew building the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River 48 km (30 miles) to the southeast. Back in the East, Siegel captivated his fellow mobsters with the idea of building a gambling mecca in the Nevada desert, complete with a casino, hotel and entertainment. Siegel returned to the West Coast and began working on his dream to construct a hotel-casino complex on what later would become known as the Las Vegas Strip. Siegel called the place the "Flamingo," his pet name for Virginia Hill. The reality is that the Mafia had had a presence in Las Vegas casinos dating back to at least 1941 . The swank Flamingo was actually conceived and started by Los Angeles businessman and ''Hollywood Reporter'' publisher Billy Wilkerson , who turned the project over to Siegel after running short of funds. In return, Siegel permitted Wilkerson to retain a one-third ownership. THE FLAMINGO FIASCO However, Siegel knew little about construction; many of his plans were unreasonably lavish, such as his insistence that each room have its own private sewer line. Under his oversight, the construction costs ballooned from $1 million to $6 million. The Del Webb company, which was in charge of construction, is alleged to have driven building materials onto the site before simply driving them out the back gate and billing Siegel for the work, though materials shortages owing to the recently-concluded Second World War also increased costs. When Webb told Siegel of his fears that he would come to harm, Siegel reputedly joked: "Don't worry, Del. We only kill each other." The Mafia members on the East Coast who had invested in Siegel's project began to suspect that Siegel was stealing money from them. Because Hill had been making frequent trips to Zurich , the mob worried that Siegel might be putting the money into Swiss bank accounts. In December 1946 , several of Siegel's business and crime partners flew to Havana, Cuba , for a meeting with Luciano, who was now directing American Mafia operations from Italy after being paroled from prison in the United States and deported. One of the main topics for discussion at the Havana Conference was whether they should order a hit on Siegel, who was kept in the dark about the meeting. Lansky, who remembered fondly how Siegel had saved his life on various occasions when they were young, took a stand against the hit and asked them to give Siegel a chance by waiting until after the casino had opened. Luciano, who believed that Siegel could still make a profit in Las Vegas and pay back what he owed the Mafia investors, agreed to cancel the hit. Siegel opened his still-unfinished casino on the star-studded night of December 26 , 1946 , although he did not have as many Hollywood celebrities with him as he had hoped. Soon the Flamingo ran dry of entertainers and customers, and the casino closed after only two weeks in order to complete construction. The fully operational Flamingo re-opened in March of 1947. That spring, the casino's gangster investors once again met in Havana to decide whether to "liquidate" Siegel. But, luckily for Siegel, he had turned a profit for the month of that second meeting, so Lansky again spoke up in support of his old friend and convinced Luciano to give Siegel one last chance. THE LAST ACT Eventually, Siegel's business venture in Las Vegas failed. Hill stole the money Siegel owed the mob and fled to ''. Other references to this form of demise come from '' The Sopranos '', where the character of Brendan Filone is also executed with a bullet through the eye. CULTURAL REFERENCES
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