engineering

Harold's Club

Harold's Club is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Harold's Club rather than just read about it. In short: Harold's Club, also spelled Harolds Club, was a casino in Downtown Reno, Nevada that was established in 1935. The casino closed in 1995 and the building was demolished in 1999.

Key takeaways

Harold's Club belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Harold's Club to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Harold's Club from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Harold's Club, also spelled Harolds Club, was a casino in Downtown Reno, Nevada that was established in 1935. The casino closed in 1995 and the building was demolished in 1999. Harold's Club was the set for the 1955 movie 5 Against the House. An Ocean's 11 predecessor set in Reno, the movie provides the best view of Harold's Club casino.

History Harold's Club casino was established in 1935 by Harold S. Smith Sr. (1910–1985) and his brother, Raymond A. Smith. Soon afterwards, their father, Raymond I. ("Pappy") Smith (1887–1967), was appointed general manager and became the public face of the casino. The casino expanded by buying adjacent Virginia Street properties. Harold's Club constructed a seven-story building as part of the casino, but never had a hotel on the property. Pappy Smith developed a marketing campaign that made the casino famous, using more than two thousand billboards across the United States advertising "Harold's Club or Bust", often written on a Conestoga wagon. (By the 1970s, most of the billboards had been taken down because of the Highway Beautification Act.) Harold's Club was sold to Howard Hughes's Summa Corporation in 1970 for $11.5 million. In December 1994, the casino was sold to Gamma International Ltd. and closed three months later. The casino was then sold to Harrah's Reno in 1999 and demolished. The property is now an outdoor plaza for concerts and special events. The casino building had an American Bandstand restaurant and nightclub for 8 years during the 1990s. Harold's Club was the target of a casino heist in the 1955 feature film 5 Against the House. A large 70-by-35-foot (21 by 11 m) mural of Old West pioneer settlers that was in front of the casino is now on display at the Reno Livestock Events Center, about 2 miles (3.2 km) from the old casino location. The mural was designed by Theodore McFallon and constructed by Sargent Claude Johnson.

References

Further reading Smith, Harold S. Sr.; Noble, John Wesley (1961). I Want To Quit Winners. Prentice Hall. ASIN B000NWLINI. Noble, John Wesley (2003). Harold's Club or Bust. Nevada Historical Society. ISBN 978-0-9728773-0-5. King, R.T. (2003). A Family Affair: Harolds Club and the Smiths Remembered. University of Nevada Oral History Program. ISBN 978-1-56475-381-6.[1]

External links "The Rise and Fall of Harold's Club" on YouTube Harold's Club at Old Reno

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Harold's Club

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Harold's Club claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Harold's Club before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Harold's Club ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Harold's Club

In research: Harold's Club appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Harold's Club in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Harold's Club is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1935 establishments in Nevada, 1995 disestablishments in Nevada, Buildings and structures completed in 1935, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Harold's Club outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Harold's Club in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Harold's Club means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Harold's Club out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Harold's Club in simple terms?

Harold's Club, also spelled Harolds Club, was a casino in Downtown Reno, Nevada that was established in 1935. The casino closed in 1995 and the building was demolished in 1999.

Why does Harold's Club matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Harold's Club?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Harold's Club.