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The Showboat made bowling part of the casino business. At 2800 Fremont Street, away from the main Strip, its riverboat styling and tournament lanes gave it a recognizable identity. It opened on September 3, 1954, became Castaways in 2000 and closed on January 29, 2004. That last name belonged to this same property; it did not mean that the earlier Strip Castaways had moved here.
A riverboat away from the Strip
William J. Moore and J. Kell Houssels were central to the original development. UNLV’s company collection describes a Mississippi-style riverboat setting and a later investor group associated with Houssels and Joe Kelley. The Showboat company eventually expanded beyond Nevada, but its Las Vegas flagship should be distinguished from the separate Showboat in Atlantic City.
Bowling as a reason to return
Bowling brought both neighborhood players and a national television audience. A Showboat advertisement in the fall 1979 Nevada Magazine promoted 106 championship lanes and named professional, military and amateur competitions. These were complementary ways to fill the resort: a tournament could bring visiting players, while leagues gave local bowlers reasons to return. The advertisement establishes what the operator offered then, not a claim that those facilities survive.
The lanes and their community
The lanes also had a community life beyond the casino floor. In a February 2004 account, bowling reporter Jeff Wolf interviewed longtime participants about the closure and the scramble to relocate leagues and tournaments. His account describes the PBA event’s move to The Orleans in 2000 and return to Castaways in 2003. The resort’s sporting identity outlasted its original name.
Castaways: a new name, then closure
Harrah’s acquired the Showboat company in 1998 and sold the Las Vegas property to VSS Enterprises in 2000. VSS adopted Castaways as its new name. Financial trouble followed: bankruptcy proceedings began in 2003, and a lender’s enforcement action ended normal casino and hotel operation the following January. Station Casinos acquired the closed property later in 2004. Ownership and branding changes were separate from demolition, which followed in January 2006.
A divided site and a surviving sign
The land’s next uses did not reproduce the old resort. Showboat Park Apartments occupies part of the former grounds, while Wildfire on Fremont opened in 2023 on another portion of the larger site. The original casino, hotel and bowling complex have gone. The retained history photograph records Showboat signage at the Neon Boneyard in February 2014. That surviving artifact was photographed at a museum, not at the former Fremont Street casino site.