Originally opened in November 2001 by the Maloof family, the Palms Casino Resort is located off the Las Vegas Strip on Flamingo Road, and it sought to appeal to typical Las Vegas tourists, as well as celebrities and high-rollers. The property was beset with numerous financial challenges, including a decrease in tourism in the months following 9/11, the 2008 recession, and the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result of that instability, the property changed hands a number of times, including in 2016, when the Palms was acquired by Red Rock Resorts, Inc., the parent company of Station Casinos LLC. In 2021, the ownership changed again, when it was acquired by the San Manual Band of Mission Indians (SMBMI) for $650 million. At the time of the Palms’ reopening by the SMBMI, the property had been closed for two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s reopening in 2022 made history as the first property in Las Vegas to be fully owned and operated by a Native American tribe.
The SMBMI are a federally recognized tribe who have called the area around San Bernardino, California their ancestral home for hundreds of years.
The Palms signage in the Neon Boneyard was donated to the Neon Museum in 2013 and comes from an early 2000s billboard advertisement, originally located about 2 blocks east of the property’s location. The billboard incorporated a neon sign atop of its façade, measuring about 19 feet in length. In total, the sign incorporates 28 units of neon. The signage originally featured wooden backing, which has since been replaced with aluminum due to safety and preservation needs.