Most Beautiful Casino Racks (5 Viewers)

[FDLmold]

I suspect these chips are leaded. I didn't do much research but as far as I can tell they are pre-1997. British cruise line chips. (For the most part, if you have a THC chip with a shaped textured inlay, there is a 99% chance it is leaded. Paulson stopped real shaped inlays about the same time they stopped putting lead into chips and about the same time they encouraged casinos to use the infinitely inferior RHC. I think. Somebody will chime in if I'm wrong.)

They are simple with mostly monochromatic edge spots. But I like the inlay (even though it is could be argued that the pic is a porpoise and not a dolphin if you are into such semantics), there is some shaped inlay going on here too, and that hundo, WOW, very nice chip there. I'm impressed.

 

[buffalojim]

I suspect these chips are leaded. I didn't do much research but as far as I can tell they are pre-1997. British cruise line chips. (For the most part, if you have a THC chip with a shaped textured inlay, there is a 99% chance it is leaded. Paulson stopped real shaped inlays about the same time they stopped putting lead into chips and about the same time they encouraged casinos to use the infinitely inferior RHC. I think. Somebody will chime in if I'm wrong.)

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They are simple with mostly monochromatic edge spots. But I like the inlay (even though it is could be argued that the pic is porpoise and not a dolphin if you are into such semantics), there is some shaped inlay going on here too, and that hundo, WOW, very nice chip there. I'm impressed.

I only see a dolphin, and yeah, that hundo is killer!

 

[FDLmold]

This is a Mahi Mahi, or common dolphinfish, often referred to on restaurant menus as "dolphin", especially on the gulf coast.

 

[buffalojim]

This is a Mahi Mahi, or common dolphinfish, often referred to on restaurant menus as "dolphin", especially on the gulf coast.
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Huh, no clue, interesting.

 

[FDLmold]

Huh, no clue, interesting.

The first time I ever saw "dolphin" on the menu, I looked at the people I was eating with and acted surprised that we could eat Flipper. Then I got educated. It was a little humorous.

 

[buffalojim]

The first time I ever saw "dolphin" on the menu, I looked at the people I was eating with and acted surprised that we could eat Flipper. Then I got educated. It was a little humorous.

I don't want to eat dolphin dolphin or dolphin fish lol, I'll eat some cod, maybe some haddock, that's about it

 

[TRKingChips]

Time for another one! This evening I found a day cruise that operated out of Mississippi in 1989 for eight months. That's all chipguide says.

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That hundo! All chips are good or better, except the white plain boring $1. A few here are just fantastic. Anybody locate the hoard? '89 was a looooooong time ago, but older hoards have been found.

What a great find !!!! Love the colors …

 

[FDLmold]

I picked up a Four Queens chip recently, but its condition was too much bicycle tire for me to use it for its intended purpose, so I traded it to @BamaT8ter for some other chips that I could use. And it got me thinking that Four Queens has been open since the 1960s, and literally hundreds of casinos have opened AND shut in that time. For some reason, some of the downtown casinos are very resilient and have managed to stay open for 50+ years (El Cortez, Four Queens, Fremont). I've already highlighted El Cortez earlier in this thread, and the Fremont chips are mostly ass. Four Queens chips overall are not that great either. Lots of plastic in there, some coin in centers, and a house mold with a thin outer band that is ugly.

BUT, Four Queens has had some moments for sure. Take a time machine to the 1960s, these arodies might have been Four Queens first chips.

WHOA! These have to be my favorite casino rack of arodie chips ever. I can't think of any better ones off the top of my head. Good luck collecting these. The frac is gettable at $100-150, and the dollar chip is $50 or so. The fiver is X rarity, so the market is about $400-500 for it.

The $25 is freaking Z6, which means $5000-8000 guide price.

Outta my league.

Now we get to Bama's obsession, the top hat and cane series of chips. The frac I've included as well because it dates to a similar time at the casino.

Pretty great! Nice progression, good contrast and colors, leaded, all hub inlay, THC. Really really solid. The $500 chip is not bigger than the others, I was just too lazy to resize the image I got from chipguide. You can buy these for face value or so, although there is no market for the $500 chip, and it may just be a prototype.

And now we get to my favorite Four Queens chip. Which is probably my favorite hundo ever. Four Queens ordered zero other chips in this "For The Games People Play" series. Not a $25, not a $500, not a $1, just this H&C chip. Weird.

This chip didn't win the 2020 PCF's favorite black chip, but it should have. A lot of PCA fanboys and fangirls voted for that chip instead. Face value has a good shot at landing you this chip.

 

[BamaT8ter]

Four Queens is definitely up and down, but when it’s good, it’s hot damn good.

 

[buffalojim]

That bearclaw hundo should have definitely won, I agree.

 

[FDLmold]

These Saddle West (Pahrump NV) chips date to the 1980s. They are not live! But they are oh so pretty. That $5 chip, SWEET.

 

[Rieguy]

Saw a single on eBay and wanted to check out the whole lineup. Crystal Casino (Renaissance) in Aruba which appears to have closed a couple years back. These are fire (apologies as I'm unsure how to do the more sophisticated view like the above posts but did separate the "credit" ones):

http://chipguide.themogh.org/cg_chip2.php?id=AWORCC&sort=type

 

[PocketAces]

…couldn’t pick just one…

 

[Sprouty]

View attachment 785025View attachment 785023View attachment 785020
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…couldn’t pick just one…

I need a sample set of those Delta clubs!!!

 

[FDLmold]

Homeslice is missing this fabulous chip:

It helps punch up the set, since half the chips are nothing special.

 

[JeepologyOffroad]

since half the chips are nothing special.

 

[Tienou59]

Carlton Casino Club Line Up

 

[FDLmold]

I love the gray and black spots on the pink 1.000 chip. Very creative, and pretty rare.

 

[FDLmold]

Here's a fun one. Chipguide calls it Dodge City Club, open in Manteca, CA, from 1979 to 1981. The chips say "Brazil's". My price guide has the same dates and says Brazil's was open in the Dodge City Bar. There are only two pics of known chips I can find:

And those two chips are pretty incredible. Chipguide and my price guide both say there is a blue $1 chip. Chipguide says there is another orange $5 chip with three pink/green/brown inserts. My price guide says that chip is a $20 and not a $5. Neither makes sense to me. You don't need two $5 chips when there is no chip between the $5 and the $20. And if your $5 chip is orange, you would not also make your $20 chip orange. Those pictures do not exist from what I can find, but chipguide is notoriously incomplete. There are many known chips that have no picture in chipguide. I've seen quite a few.

But in the end, even with just these two chips, they still kick the crap out of most casino issued chips today. Good luck finding some!

 

[gopherblue]

I'm just a simple fella with modest needs...

(Admittedly, these are slightly altered from the original "casino" rack.)

 

[FDLmold]

I liked your Riverside splashed pot better. I'm in the camp where the Palais chips have never really done it for me.

 

[Rakrul]

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The $1 is weak, like blecch. But the rest of these? Magnificent! From Venezuela. Opened in '96, and these were the original chips, so all lead (Pb) baby.

Curacao is a Caribbean island that's a part of the Dutch Antilles, and it's the C in the ABC-islands (Aruba and Bonaire being the other two). I'm pretty sure I've been there, but I don't know what happened to my $5. Probably gave it away when selling some chips.

 

[FDLmold]

View attachment 525980

The $1 is weak, like blecch. But the rest of these? Magnificent! From Venezuela. Opened in '96, and these were the original chips, so all lead (Pb) baby.

I had Emerald Curacao already highlighted earlier in the thread. But since I can't edit the OP anymore to say which casinos have been included so far, people will repeat great chips. And that's alright by me. I think my favorite is the $5, followed by the $2.50.

 

[FDLmold]

Shy Clown - open once for a couple years in the 1970s, then open again for about five years after that, finally closing for good in 1981. The scrown chips are from the first attempt, the Paulsons are from the second.

There is no record in chipguide or Chip Rack of a regular $1 chip at either establishment, and I couldn't find any legitimate $1 tokens either. I was reading the other day that 70% of all "USMint Eisenhower $1 coins" in circulation were at one time in Nevada casinos. The reasonably logical conclusion here is that every game at both of these establishments just used Eisenhowers as their $1 chips. I love the big numbers and funky fonts on the inlays. That 25 cent hot stamp is unique, so it's also really good. My favorite chips are both of the $25 chips. There's a lot to like here, and none of the chips are horribly expensive. They should all be leaded.

 

[FDLmold]

Only two chips from this place. Washington card rooms and casinos do have some very limited racks from time to time. Like the Riffle Steins apparently having lots and lots of $1 chips, with some 50c and $5 chips that have never showed up in the market and appear to be hardly used.

At any rate, today we get two beautiful chips from Waterfront Tavern in Bellingham, WA. Open in 1979, closed in ??. I'll take racks of both please. I love this inlay - the water, the birds, and the color matched denominations. Really sharp for 1979.

 

[Nanook]

Only two chips from this place. ........ Waterfront Tavern in Bellingham, WA. Open in 1979, closed in ??. I'll take racks of both please. I love this inlay - the water, the birds, and the color matched denominations. Really sharp for 1979.

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Lots in this thread one could draw inspiration from for a custom set. This one speaks to me....love it

 

[FDLmold]

So here's a fun one. I'm going through some singles I own, and researching other singles that came from the same series at the same casino. I have a couple solid blue Paradise (Las Vegas) $1 hot stamp chips, but no others in the series. It didn't take me long to figure out why I had never seen them, because the $5 Paradise sells for $350, the $25 sells for $400, and the $100 chip is even rarer and more expensive. Part of my research showed that the casino was open for a year or less, which explains the rarity of the singles (the chips were likely chucked into the trash when the casino closed).

These are all chipguide photos. Chipguide has a useful feature that shows you what branding a casino used to have, and also what it became. At 115 E Tropicana Ave, Paradise was first for a year, then 20th Century for a couple years, then The Treasury for 3-4 years (only one THC chip, the rest are plastic ugly coin in center chips), then the site closed for a few years, then it was the Hotel San Remo for almost two decades, then it was Hooters, and now it is OYO. Six brandings in 45 years is a lot.

Here's the best chips I saw from this "property". Hooters and OYO are all unleaded house mold chips, and the house molds are ugly. You can look those up yourselves. The Paradise are my favorites, though the $5 is a bit ugly. The $25 is world class. The 20th Century hot stamps are excellent chips too. I own a couple Paradise $1 chips, as I mentioned above, and I also have a San Remo $5.

 

[buffalojim]

So here's a fun one. I'm going through some singles I own, and researching other singles that came from the same series at the same casino. I have a couple solid blue Paradise (Las Vegas) $1 hot stamp chips, but no others in the series. It didn't take me long to figure out why I had never seen them, because the $5 Paradise sells for $350, the $25 sells for $400, and the $100 chip is even rarer and more expensive. Part of my research showed that the casino was open for a year or less, which explains the rarity of the singles (the chips were likely chucked into the trash when the casino closed).

These are all chipguide photos. Chipguide has a useful feature that shows you what branding a casino used to have, and also what it became. At 115 E Tropicana Ave, Paradise was first for a year, then 20th Century for a couple years, then The Treasury for 3-4 years (only one THC chip, the rest are plastic ugly coin in center chips), then the site closed for a few years, then it was the Hotel San Remo for almost two decades, then it was Hooters, and now it is OYO. Six brandings in 45 years is a lot.

Here's the best chips I saw from this "property". Hooters and OYO are all unleaded house mold chips, and the house molds are ugly. You can look those up yourselves. The Paradise are my favorites, though the $5 is a bit ugly. The $25 is world class. The 20th Century hot stamps are excellent chips too. I own a couple Paradise $1 chips, as I mentioned above, and I also have a San Remo $5.

View attachment 835125

Really digging the inlay on the Paradise Hotel chips and the green denom is different and cool. Spot progression looks to certainly be a thing when it comes to the Hotel San Remo, that's for sure. I really like the $25 chip in that lineup.

 

[AfterTheFact]

I’m missing the 5k

 

[FDLmold]

Love these chips. The 5k for those who don't know (chipguide photo)