Ah, Cuba in the 1950s: Drugs, prostitution, gambling. It was a playground for the rich and well-connected – almost all of whom were from the United States. And most of it was run by the Mob.
On New Year’s Day, 1959, Fidel Castro put a stop to that. The Cuban revolution had a great many causes, but one of them was a reaction to the corruption of the government of Fulgencio Batista, which left Cubans in abject poverty on the edges of the vast display of wealth from northern visitors.
On that day in 1959, it is said that Meyer Lansky lost it all. Two years before, he had opened the Riviera Hotel, the swankiest and most technologically advanced operation in Cuba (it had air conditioning!). According to his grandson, Gary Rappaport, Lansky and his mob associates put $14 million into the Riviera. His grandfather had only recouped $6 million when the Castro government took it over.
Rappaport now wants at least part of the remaining $8 million back, and he, his mother and uncle have petitioned the U.S. government to help them.
That's a long shot, according to Geoff Schumacher.
Schumacher is a mob historian and is currently the director of content for the Mob Museum in downtown Las Vegas. He says that the Cuban government is not likely to help out the family of a man they saw to be instrumental in Batista's regime.
Lansky was initially not worried about Castro. Yes, he was Batista's man - the former dictator had brought Lansky in to run the casinos in Cuba. But Lansky figured he could pay off anybody who was in power. But, Schumacher says, he didn't figure on the new power structure being so full of social idealism.
Rappaport is more hopeful that his family will get some compensation... eventually. He points out that Cuba is changing, and that it would be a wise economic decision to pull on Cuba's gaming roots as the country develops a new relationship with the U.S. In that endeavor, he hopes Cuba will be more willing to work with him and his family.
Note: KNPR consultant and long-time Las Vegas newsman Bob Stoldal was recently in the Riviera in Havana. He says the place has held up remarkably well, and is a must-see for tourists visiting Cuba.
Gary Rappaport, grandson of Meyer Lansky; Geoff Schumacher, mob historian and director of content for the Mob Museum
