Sam's Town Casino was scheduled to quietly close Wednesday night, becoming the first Missouri casino to fail and one of only a handful nationally.

Boyd Gaming Corp, the casino's Las Vegas-based owner, announced on June 30 that the Judy's Prize riverboat casino and 31-acre Sam's Town complex would be sold to competitor Harrah's Entertainment Inc. for $12.5 million and close within 60 days.

Boyd officials early Wednesday quietly confirmed the closing. No ranking Boyd executives were on hand for the final day, with fewer than 400 casino workers still on the payroll.

Norm Powell, general manager at Sam's Town from the beginning, has already started work as deputy general manager at Boyd's Sam's Town Casino in Las Vegas.

Boyd spokesman Rob Stillwell held a low-key news conference at the Kansas City casino Wednesday afternoon and was scheduled to be on a flight back to Las Vegas about the time the final session of Sam's Town gamblers was boarding the vessel at 10 p.m.

"This is not what we anticipated when we came into this market," Stillwell said. "We didn't expect it to end this way."

Harrah's says it's made no decision about the future of the riverboat complex, but top executives met Wednesday with Kansas City officials to discuss the acquisition.

"We're working on revenue-generating uses for that facility," said Harrah's spokesman Jeff Hook. "We don't know what that is right now. We're getting a lot of calls from people who want to purchase it, or have good ideas or want us to donate it to good causes."

Sam's Town, which opened in September 1995, has lagged behind market leader Harrah's and the area's three other casinos in the fight for market share.

The casino lost money every month since the massive Station Casino Kansas City opened early last year.

Sam's, with perhaps inferior location and access, could not compete successfully with the twin-boat Harrah's and Station properties or even the one-boat Argosy and Flamingo Hilton casinos.

Wednesday afternoon, Sam's near-deserted gambling and dining areas echoed with calls of "goodbye" and "good luck" as a trickle of employees and last-day gamblers filtered through the complex.

About 3 p.m., one housekeeping employee dutifully swept a spotless carpet at the top of the casino's main entry escalator. A few minutes later, another housekeeping employee wandered by and swept the same area.

Nearby, security staffers and other Sam's workers chatted in small groups. There was no more work to be done.

The employees still on the payroll Wednesday will receive company benefits and be paid through Aug. 31. Station and Harrah's together have hired about 200 others so far and expect to hire more.

Seven Missouri Highway Patrol officers assigned to Sam's as state gaming agents will be reassigned to other casinos.

"We've got some vacancies and can absorb them," said Mel Fisher, interim executive director of the Missouri Gaming Commission.

The closing "was at least a week overdue," said one worker who complained that company officials had led employees to believe for months that the struggling casino would stay in business.

Since the June 30 announcement, visits by gamblers plummeted. At the end, the casino was operating only a few table games and a couple hundred slot machines on one deck of the three-deck boat.

Under terms of the sale, Harrah's will assume ownership on or before Wednesday.

The facility includes a 254-foot-long riverboat that is U.S. Coast Guard-certified to navigate the river. There's also a 1,300-car parking garage and an 80,000-square-foot retail, dining and office structure - with Victorian Era red-brick and walnut accents.

By the numbers

$145 million: cost to build

$12.5 million: sale price to Harrah's

1,162: slot machines and other games closed down

96.18%: "Kansas City's loosest" $1 slot payback rate at Sam's

$141 million: gross gambling revenues since opening Sept. 13, 1995

$41 million: total state and local gambling taxes paid since opening

$122,562: Kansas City's monthly share (at current rate)

$350,000: amount Boyd Gaming Corp. still must pay annually through 2005 to local charities, civic groups and others for various purposes

396: estimated number of employees on Sam's payroll at midnight July 15

Sources: Missouri Gaming Commission, Sam's Town, Star research