The Green Shack
2500 E. Freemont (1 block west of the Showboat)
Information from Harvey J Fuller's Index of Nevada Gaming Establishments
Green Shack (1) (?) 12-2-1932 through 1938
Green Shack (2) (Wilbur Clark) 1938 through 1938
Green Shack (3) (Jones) 1938 through 6-28-1951
Green Shack (4) (McDonald) 6-28-1951 through 2-6-1956
Closed in May of 1999
Demolished in 2005
The Green Shack restaurant, 2504 E. Fremont St., has kept its doors open since Jimmie Jones
served biscuits and coffee to the Boulder Dam workers from the back of her one-room home.
"Most history starts with Bugsy Siegel. But there was a town here long before that," says Jim
McCormick, Jones' nephew and current owner of the restaurant, which some say serves the best
fried chicken in town.
"Bugsy hung out at the Green Shack, this is where the idea (for the Flamingo hotel) got
started," he claims. "If it weren't for the Green Shack, it would mean no Las Vegas as we
know it."
There is a certain vibe within the wooden walls of the restaurant, where deals were once
struck and politicians got drunk with their constituents.
¥ The Green Shack restaurant at 2504 E. Fremont St. remains standing. The building has not
been an operating restaurant for more than three years, and the former owners, Jim and
Barbara McCormick, could not be located to comment on its prospects. The Green Shack opened
in 1932 when Mettie "Jimmie" Jones bought a green building from the railroad and moved it to
Fremont Street. Her first customers were Hoover Dam workers who gobbled down the house
specialty: fried chicken and mashed potatoes. The tables in the Green Shack were once used in
the Hoover Dam cafeteria. Later, the Green Shack was a popular gathering place for the city's
movers and shakers.
Once upon a time, this blighted building served the food that fueled the construction of
Hoover Dam. Begun in 1930 as the Colorado and renamed the Green Shack in 1932, the restaurant
kept Las Vegas full through its unlikely Depression-era growth in the years before World War
II. Serving fried chicken and mashed potatoes--and bootleg whiskey--the Green Shack drew an
improbable cross-section of Las Vegans. Politicians schmoozed; lawyers
strategized; dam
workers stopped to throw back a few drinks on the way home; families and fraternal groups
made it their spot for celebrations. The eatery, owned and operated by one family for nearly
its whole life span, was the city's oldest restaurant when owners Jim and Barbara McCormick
closed the doors in May 1999.
The Green Shack, formerly listed on the local and National Register of Historic Places, was
located at 2524 Fremont Street, near Eastern Avenue. The building was owned by Mrs. Mattie
Jones, who began life as a restaurateur in 1929, selling bootleg whiskey, chicken and
biscuits from a window in her home. This was the “Colorado Restaurant," which was located
across the street from the former Green Shack. The original building was razed in 1930 and,
as the story goes, Ms. Jones moved the restaurant across the street into fine new digs
provided by the Union Pacific Railroad Co. in the form of a railroad barracks building. The
Green Shack sat vacant from 1999, falling prey to vandalism, theft, and structural
deterioration, until it was finally demolished in 2005 to make way for a proposed banquet
hall. So far, nothing has been constructed on the site.
The Green Shack, on Boulder Highway just south of Charleston Boulevard, is just that -- a
green boarded up shack. But the story behind the building, formerly the Colorado, adds
uniqueness to the site that others don't have.
The Colorado opened in 1930 in the two-room home of Mattie Jones, who offered chicken,
biscuits and bootleg whiskey from a window. In 1932, the home was razed and a railroad
barracks building formerly owned by the Union Pacific was moved to the present location
across Boulder Highway and renamed the Green Shack. After Jones' death, the business was
operated by the bar manager and his family until 1999, when it was closed.
This 1920s linen postcard reads: "Swanky Club, On U.S. 93, 95, and 466, between Boulder (Hoover)
Dam and Las Vegas, Nevada."
The phone number was 142-W. The club advertises "Bar, Casino, Smorgasbord, Specializing in
chicken and steaks, Open 4 pm to 12 midnight."
The Swanky Club Casino in Pittman, NV (now a part of Henderson) closed in 1984
Matchbook scans courtesy of Ebay seller nestlesquick
