I hate rumors!
Rumors ruin chips. Everyday I talk with different chip people who pass along the latest rumors they have heard. I could take any of them and write a "book" but I am going to write about the one causing a great deal of damage to our hobby.

"The Sands Rumor"
The Sands rumor started last year and has grown into one of the largest chip destroying rumors in our hobby.

Let's review what the "fuss" is all about. Around the time a certain individual outbid his competition for a $5.00 Sanda arrowdie the rumor started that two of these $5.00 Sands arrowdies CAME FROM this palette of Sands chips located within the Sands Convention center.

At the time I didn't pay much attention to such a rumor merely writing it off as "sour grapes" from the losers in the private auction and/or jealous people who couldn't afford to EVER bid for such a chip.

Approximately a few weeks or a month or two later at a chip show a couple of dealers were offered some Sands chips by an individual who claimed to be a one time security guard at the Sands. Immediately the rumor was started again that the few Sands chips this self proclaimed security guard was selling MUST HAVE COME from this palette of chips located in the Sands convention center.Maybe this one time security guard stole them. How dumb can you get? I decided to get to the bottom of the Sands Convention center rumor.

I have talked with various people involved with the Sands Convention center. Some of them I have known for many years. A couple who still work there. Unless long time friends who don't collect chips would lie to me - there is no palette of chips waiting to be sold, stolen or what have you. One individual did say it "might" be possible that leftover chips & tokens from the closing that remained unsold could be stored there. I doubt this since ALL chips were sold by the night of the closing.Including the ones I bought; you know the orange and blue $1.00 chips. I also know for a fact a certain individual who is no longer involved in our hobby bought everything and anything that was left including the last issue baccarats. Even the roulettes were sold. When everyone was ordered out of the hotel prior to locking the doors, to my knowledge, not a chip remained. Tokens? maybe - chips not a one!

After the closing and implosion of the Sands, I was at an Arizona Charlies chip show where four sets of OLD ISSUE Sands baccarat chips housed in removeable lucite holders had surfaced. They were brought in by two little old ladies who claimed the chips were gifts to the executive officers of the hotel many years ago. The sets sold quickly for a fairly good sum of money. I followed the ladies out in the hall way and talked with them about the chips they had just sold. At the end of our discussion I was satisfied that four sets were all there were. None have surfaced since. However, the dealers who missed out on the purchase immediately started with "those chips must have come from the Convention center hoard". I just laughed and told them they got to be faster on the draw.

Day before yesterday a chip friend called me to do him a favor. Since he was no good at buying and selling would I help him dispose of his Las Vegas chips. He wanted to sell some of his high priced high denomination Las Vegas chips including a high denomination Sands chip a few at a time. The chip was listed as unique in the "Official" book. I said isn't that the chip you bought from Jerry years ago? He said yes and reminded me I helped negotiate the price he paid Jerry. At the time it was claimed by Jerry to be a one of a kind chip. I believe it still is unless of course a box of them is sitting on that palette. over at the convention center. I asked him why he was getting rid of it and he said he was only going to collect Northern Nevada and was going to sell all of his Las Vegas chips. The high dollar high denomination ones first. If I helped him sell his chips I could have first pick of anything I wanted.

I called an associate collector who just loves this type of chip and started to describe it and how it came from Jerry years ago, etc. etc. and before I could get another word out - he said he passed! I didn't ask why. I knew why. The stupid "Sands Rumor". Rather then waste my time calling another collector of these high denomination Las Vegas chips I bought the chip myself. I will keep it until I come across an intelligent collector who wants it since I don't collect the high denomination ones myself.

The reason I am writing about this is I am sorry to see collectors taken in by the dumb and dumber rumors that circulate. Believe me if I know about a hoard I tell everyone and anyone. But I get "facts" first. Without facts anything else is just rumors. Have a Great Holiday! Best, Jim