Las Vegas has a special place in the hearts of visitors celebrating anniversaries and marriages. Two spirited couples from Florida recently visited the city and both were celebrating their wedding anniversaries. Like most of our tour goers, they were staying on the Strip, and they’d already taken in some great shows, had some special dining experiences and done some fun sightseeing.
When they arrived at the Mob Museum for our morning tour, they were eager to learn more about the history of Las Vegas, so after a short intro to the city’s historical eras, we trekked through Fremont Street, and block by block the Las Vegas story of the past century unfolded, from the corner of Main and Fremont where the town was founded in 1905, through Glitter Gulch and the historic casino district, to the spectacular electronic canopy known as the Fremont Street Experience, aka, the largest video screen in the world.
Along the way, we looked for “hearts in the landscape” and came across an artwork at the Downtown Grand Hotel & Casino, a mural mosaic of historical pictures, one of which flipped over to reveal an image of a neon heart, once part of a local Downtown sign from a bygone era.
At tour’s end, our visitors from Florida paused at one of the most famous hearts on Fremont Street, the artwork by Nova May at the Container Part, a sculpture that comes to full bloom as people attach their own metal heart momentous – padlocked onto the sculpture – a community narrative of personal written remembrances to life and love.
