1855 - First settlement by Mormons in Las Vegas.

1905 - Town of Las Vegas established by auctioning of land.

1911 - The City of Las Vegas is incorporated.

1926 - First commercial airline flight, Western Airlines.

1931 - Hoover Dam construction begins in Black Canyon.

1931 - Gambling legalized in Nevada.

1935 - Hoover Dam dedicated by President Franklin Roosevelt.

1940 - Clark County population 16,414 (Las Vegas-8,422).

1941 - El Rancho Vegas opens on the Strip. El Cortez Hotel opens in    downtown Las Vegas. El Rancho destroyed by fire 19 years later.

1942 - Last Frontier Hotel opens. (Later called New Frontier and Frontier.)

1944 - The first Helldorado parade and rodeo is conducted.

1946 - Bugsy Siegel opens Flamingo Hotel. State levies first gaming taxes.

1950 - Clark County population 48,289. (Las Vegas-24,624.)

1955 - Gaming control strengthened. Gaming Control Board created within the Nevada Tax Commission by the Legislature.

1959 - Las Vegas Convention Center opens. The Nevada Gaming Commission is created by the Legislature.

1960 - Clark County population 127,016. (Las Vegas-64,405.)

1966 - Howard Hughes arrives to live at Desert Inn.

1967 - Nevada's legislature passes a law allowing publicly traded corporations to obtain gambling licenses. The law is refined in 1969.

1970 - Clark County population 273,288. (Las Vegas-125,787.)

1975 - Nevada gaming revenues first crack $1 billion mark.

1977 - Clark County gaming revenues first crack $1 billion mark. The Nevada Legislature passes a foreign gaming law allowing Nevada-based casino owners to operate casinos outside Nevada's borders.

1980 - Clark County population hits 463,087 (Las Vegas - 164,674) as Las Vegas celebrates 75th birthday.

1981 - Las Vegas celebrates Golden Anniversary of Gaming.

1985 - First National Finals Rodeo held in Las Vegas.

1989 - Mirage opens November 22, with 3,039 rooms.

1990 - Clark County population 741,459. (Las Vegas-258,295.)

1990 - Excalibur opens June 19, to date the world's largest resort hotel with 4,032 rooms.

1992 - First Las Vegas Bowl held at Silver Bowl.

1993 - Flamingo Hilton announces plans to raze Bugsy's suite and office.

1993 - Dunes Hotel sold to Steve Wynn's Mirage Inc.; the north tower and Dunes sign imploded October 27.

1993 - Money won by Nevada casinos tops the $6 billion mark for the first time.

1993 - ITT Sheraton Corp. purchases Desert Inn Hotel from Kirk Kerkorian's Tracinda Corp.

1993 - Dunes Hotel imploded October 27.

1993 - Grand Slam Canyon Adventuredome opens August 23.

1993 - Luxor Hotel opens October 15 with 2,526 rooms.

1993 - Treasure Island Hotel opens October 27 with 2,900 rooms.

1993 - MGM Grand Hotel and Theme Park opens December 18, with 5,005 rooms and a 171,500- square-foot casino; to date the largest resort hotel-casino in the world.

1993 - Nevada Legislature passes enabling legislation for financing of "The Fremont Street Experience."

1994 - Buffalo Bill's in Primm and Boulder Station Casino on Boulder Highway in Las Vegas open.

1994 - Plans to construct New York-New York Hotel Casino at the intersection of the Strip and Tropicana Avenue announced jointly by MGM Grand and Primadonna Resorts.

1994 - Work begins on Fremont Street Experience. Downtown Fremont Street is permanently closed to automobile traffic on September 7.

1994 - The first scheduled Condor charter flight to Las Vegas from Cologne, Germany, lands November 7 at McCarran International Airport.

1994 - Sam's Town on Boulder Highway expands with the opening of a 650-room tower and lush, plant-filled atrium.

1994 - A 300-room hotel-casino named Boomtown opens on Blue Diamond Road at I-15.

1994 - Four skywalks are built over the intersection of Tropicana Boulevard and the Las Vegas Strip.

1994 - McCarran opens Interstate 15-airport connector road system that tunnels under the east-west runways.

1994 - The Fiesta, the first hotel-casino in North Las Vegas, opens with 100 rooms.

1995 - Vegas World closes its doors February 1 for work on a casino complex and the Stratosphere Tower.

1995 - The first Hard Rock Hotel opens March 10.

1995 - $25 million monorail begins running between MGM Grand and Bally's hotel-casinos on June 14.

1995 - Bill Bennett retires from Circus Circus Enterprises, then buys the Sahara Hotel-Casino from Paul and Sue Lowden.

1995 - ITT Corp. buys Caesars World Inc. for $1.7 billion, including Caesars Palace on the Las Vegas Strip.

1995 - Construction begins on Steve Wynn's 46-story, $1.7 billion 3,000-room Bellagio, located at the intersection of Flamingo Road and the Las Vegas Strip.

1995 - Circus Circus Enterprises buys Hacienda and surrounding 100 acres.

1995 - The face of downtown Las Vegas changes forever with the December 13 opening of the $70 million Fremont Street Experience.

1995 - Las Vegas reports a 29 million visitor volume for the year. Statewide gross gaming revenue surpasses $7.3 billion. Clark County produced $5.7 billion of the state's gaming revenue total.

1995 - Landmark Hotel imploded November 7.

1996 - Ground breaking ceremonies for Las Vegas Hilton's "Star Trek: The Experience" held on January 24.

1996 - The $13 million Las Vegas Strip beautification project, in which 76,000 palms, shrubs, flowering foliage and ground covers were planted, is finished in March.

1996 - Wayne Newton celebrates 25,000th Las Vegas performance. Siegfried and Roy celebrate 15,000th Las Vegas performance.

1996 - Work is completed on the Desert Inn Road arterial, creating the first tunnel under the Las Vegas Strip.

1996 - Stratosphere Tower, the tallest free-standing observation tower in the U.S. and the tallest structure west of the Mississippi River, opens April 30.

1996 - Hilton Hotels Corp. purchases Bally's Entertainment Corp., parent company of Bally's hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip for $3 billion.

1996 - Caesars Magical Empire, a multimillion dollar dining and entertainment complex opens in Caesars Palace June 18.

1996 - Monte Carlo, a joint venture between Circus Circus Enterprises Inc. and Mirage Resorts Inc. opens June 21.

1996 - The $72 million, 1,100-acre Las Vegas Motor Speedway with tracks for drag, stock car and formula car races opens in September.

1996 - Clark County Commission grants building permits for the $500 million, 2,900-room Paris Casino Resort on the Las Vegas Strip.

1996 - Hyatt Hotel Corp. announces plans to build a 500-room hotel on the shores of Lake Las Vegas

1996 - Circus Circus Enterprises announces a joint venture with Four Seasons Regent to build a 400-room, five star non-gaming hotel on the Las Vegas Strip.

1996 - The Sands Hotel, after 44 years of continuous operation, is closed June 30 by owner Sheldon Adelson who announces plans to build a 6,000-room megaresort on the Las Vegas Strip site. Sands tower imploded November 26.

1996 - Flamingo Hilton celebrates 50th anniversary. Caesars Palace celebrates 30th anniversary.

1996 - State Line, NV, at the Southern Nevada-California border, is renamed Primm in honor of the community's founder Ernest Primm.

1996 - Ground breaking held for 3,000-room Planet Hollywood Hotel Casino adjacent to The Desert Inn at Sands Avenue and the Las Vegas Strip. Construction on the joint venture between ITT Corp. and Planet Hollywood was never started.

1996 - Circus Circus implodes Hacienda Hotel Casino December 31 to make way for megaresort.

1996 - 29.6 million people visit Las Vegas in 1996; state gross gaming revenue totals $7.45 billion, and Clark County population hits 1.1 million.

1997 - The Tropicana Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip celebrates its 40th anniversary.

1997 - New York-New York Hotel Casino opens on the Las Vegas Strip January 3. More than 100,000 people a day visit the new resort during the casino's first days in operation.

1997 - Hilton Hotels Corp. makes a $10.5 billion hostile take-over move on January 28 against ITT Corp. which resists the bid. ITT shareholders reject Hilton take-over in favor of a more lucrative offer by Starwood Lodging. The deal involves ownership of Caesars Place and The Desert Inn on the Las Vegas Strip.

1997 - The 6,945-yard, par 71 Lakes Course opens February 7, the first golf course located in Primm, NV.

1997 - Sheldon Adelson breaks ground in April to build the 6,000-suite, $1.8 billion Venetian Hotel and Resort on the grounds of the original Sands Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip.

1997 – Steve Wynn, builder of Las Vegas Strip megaresorts, calls for a "go slow" approach to future expansion in Las Vegas.

1997 –The U.S. Air Force celebrates its 50^th anniversary in an unequaled display of military aviation might attended by 80 foreign, high –ranking NATO and Pacific Air command officials, and 300,000 spectators.

1997 - Coca Cola Co. opens its AWorld of Coca Cola@ store in the Showcase Mall marked by a 100- foot-tall glass Coca Cola bottle.

1997 - The first non-stop scheduled commercial flight from Frankfurt-Mein International Airport in Germany lands May 7 with 215 passengers at McCarran International Airport.

1997 - Sunset Station Hotel-Casino opens June 10.

1997 - Players Island Resort Hotel and Spa in Mesquite is purchased by Virgin River Casino and renamed CasaBlanca on July 1.

1997 - The Forum Shops at Caesars on August 29 opened 35 new shops, stores and restaurants in a 276,000-square-foot expansion. Growth doubles the size of the upscale shopping mall adjacent to Caesars Palace on the Las Vegas Strip.

1997 - The Aladdin Hotel closes on the Las Vegas Strip November 25 making way for a $1.2 billion gambling and hotel complex. Plans call for development of a Middle East-theme shopping center, a 2,600-room hotel as well as a joint venture with Planet Hollywood Inc. for development of a neighboring $250 million, 2,000-room music-theme resort. Planet Hollywood drops out of the deal in 1998.

1997 - The Desert Inn Hotel Casino completes $200 million renovation and expansion.

1997- Owners change the name of the Boomtown Hotel Casino to Silverton after Majestic Realty Co. takes control of the struggling resort from Boomtown Inc.

1997 - Harley Davidson Cafe opens on the Las Vegas Strip, continuing the theme restaurant proliferation.

1997 - Caesars Palace opens new tower in December.

1997 - Harrah's Entertainment Inc. buys Showboat Inc. in a $1.154 billion deal.

1997 - The Frontier Hotel, owned by the Elardi family, is sold to Phil Ruffin, a Kansas industrialist, for $165 million.

1997 - Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino opens Masquerade Village and new 41-story, 1,025-room tower giving the resort a total of 2,556 suites.

1997 - Alan Paulson, California entrepreneur, buys the Gold River Casino/Hotel in Laughlin. The property is renamed River Palms Resort.

1998 - "Star Trek: The Experience@ opens January 4 at the Las Vegas Hilton.

1998 - Circus Circus officials announce that Mandalay Bay will be the name of the company's new resort at the Strip and Russell Road. The hotel's working name was Project Paradise.

1998 - Starwood Hotels & Resorts buys ITT Corp. for $14.6 billion. The purchase includes acquisition of Caesars Palace and The Desert Inn hotel/casinos on the Las Vegas Strip.

1998 - Eagle Canyon Airlines buys Las Vegas-based Scenic Airlines.

1998 - The Aladdin Hotel is imploded on April 27.

1998 - Northwest Airlines inaugurates non-stop service June 1 from Tokyo to Las Vegas.

1998 - Japan Airlines inaugurates non-stop service October 2 from Tokyo to Las Vegas.

1998 - Koren Airlines makes history in August with three non-stop charter flights from Seoul, Korea, to Las Vegas.

1998 - Country Star restaurant on the Strip is acquired by Mirage Resorts Inc. and closes.

1998 – Bellagio, billed as the most expensive hotel in the world ($1.7 billion) opens October 15 on the Las Vegas Strip and initiates a policy barring persons under 18 years of age who are not registered guests of the hotel.

1998 - Las Vegas Convention Center opens an expansion, boosting its total space to 1.9 million square feet.

1998 - The Debbie Reynolds hotel-casino, a half block east of the Las Vegas Strip on Convention Center Drive, is sold at public auction August 5 to the World Wresting Federation for $9.27 million.

1998 - The Las Vegas Motor Speedway is sold in December by founders Bill Bennett and Ralph Englestad to North Carolina-based Speedway Motorsports Inc., headed by O. Bruton Smith, for $215 million.

1998 - Proposition 5 is passed by California voters in November, opening the door for casino-style gambling on American Indian reservations.

1998 - A 66-year-old Las Vegas resident hits a $27.58 million progressive Megabucks jackpot November 15 at the Palace Station Hotel Casino.

1998 - The D gates open at McCarran International Airport.

1998 - Annual gross gaming revenue in Nevada hits the $8.1 billion mark.

1998 - Annual number of visitors to Las Vegas totals 30.6 million people.

1998 - Hilton Hotels Corp. spins off its gaming division to Park Place Entertainment Corp., including the Las Vegas Hilton, Flamingo Hilton, Bally's and Paris Las Vegas on the Strip, December 31.

1999 - Harrah's Entertainment Inc. purchases the Rio Hotel-Casino Inc. for $888 million, Jan. 1.

1999 - MGM Grand Inc. buys Primadonna Resorts Inc., taking100 percent ownership of New York- New York Hotel-Casino on the Las Vegas Strip and Whiskey Pete's, Buffalo Bill's and Primm Valley Resort & Casino in Primm, NV, March 1.

1999 - Mandalay Bay Resort opens March 2 with 3,300 rooms.

1999 - Four Seasons Hotel opens March 2 with 424 rooms

1999 - Japan Airlines adds a fourth nonstop flight per week in April from Tokyo to Las Vegas.

1999 - Phase I of the Venetian Resort-Hotel-Casino opens May 3 with 3,036 suites.

1999 - The Las Vegas Convention Center celebrates its 40th birthday.

1999 - Circus Circus Enterprises changes its name to Mandalay Resort Group.

1999 - The Resort at Summerlin opens July 15.

1999 - Paris Las Vegas Casino Resort opens September 1, 1999

1999 – Barbra Streisand, Bette Midler, Rod Stewart, Elton John, Tina Turner, Wayne Newton and Don Rickles are among the many entertainers booked by Las Vegas resorts to ring in the new century.

2000 – A $3 billion deal closes to sell Caesars World Inc., including Caesars Palace on the Las Vegas Strip, to Park Place Entertainment.

2000 – Phil Ruffin, owner of the New Frontier, announces the Strip resort will be imploded and a San Francisco-themed hotel built on the site.

2000 – The Resort at Summerlin changes its name to The Regent Las Vegas.

2000 – MGM Grand Inc. announces the purchase of Mirage Resorts Inc., creating the largest corporate buyout in gaming history.