Your Incredible Neighbors: Casino jobs not all fun and games

After earning teaching degrees in North Dakota, neither Terry nor Sandy Kudrna ended up in a traditional school. Instead they left for Lake Tahoe, and after a stint working as a cashier and hostess, Sandy signed up for “dealing school.”

Starting out as a bar attendant, then bartender Terry worked his way up to a successful career in food and beverage for 29 years where he did the wine selection and pricing for Harvey’s Resort Hotel Casino’s seven restaurants and six bars. When a new manager told him he’d have to work rotating shifts that included evenings, Terry left and also went to “dealing school.”

As they describe it, “dealing school” is a three-week program. “You need to be able to count etc. — and perform to ‘their’ expectations,” Sandy said.

Starting with Black Jack, where she learned single deck and double deck games, she also learned the “shoe game” that involves eight decks. Baccarat, roulette, craps, and poker schools followed, so Sandy was well-versed in all the casino games.

Skilled at her work, she became a high limits dealer where the stakes are high. Being watched with hidden cameras became second nature, she said. “After a while, you ignore it. You’re focused on your work; there’s so much to watch and do.

“You go where you’re assigned; it’s important to keep up in all games for yourself,” she said.

Looking back, Sandy said meeting all kinds of people from all over the world was an appealing part of the job and she enjoyed being able to come across favorably to people, an important skill at a gaming table. Over the years she’s enjoyed learning the psychology of people and says, “I can read people really well.”

Casino smoke, they agreed, was brutal. They brought their own fans for relief, but some players would move the fans for their personal relief. Terry said when Harrah’s bought Harvey’s, everything turned in favor of accommodating smokers because the consensus was that smokers gambled more. “Now it’s all smoking,” Terry said.

Asked about a single player who lost a huge amount, Sandy recalled one man who started out playing with $10,000 and lost $350,000. “He lost it in eight hours; his goal was to walk away with $500,000… the longer you stay at the table, the more likely the winnings will go to the house,” she said.

Terry, who had five years in as a dealer before retiring in 2005, said it’s important to set winning and losing limits, but both agreed that for those who are addicted to gambling, what they win is never enough.

Switching from almost three decades in food and beverage to dealing cards came easy to Terry because he said he’s very good with numbers. Selecting which wines were offered at the casino’s different restaurants and bar, an unexpected reward of the work was becoming a self-taught wine expert. “I made my own Pinor Noir for eight years,” he said as he showed off a still-unopened five liter bottle. In 1989, his Zephyr Cellars Pinot Noir won the gold medal at the California State Fair in Sacramento.

At the couple’s 18-foot- by 7-foot-wide wine cellar in Lake Tahoe, the walls, floor and ceiling were covered with the ends of wooden wine cases; at one time they had about 12,000 bottles. Today, their collection at their home in Quail Creek is about 500 bottles, all well cared for in a state-of-the-art wine cooler.

Recalling dangerous times in the casino, Sandy said, “There was the time a guy got up real fast and picked up his chair. I thought he was going to throw it at me; I was ready to get under the table.”

Terry remembered when a guy smashed a glass of Tequila Sunrise on the table. “He picked me up when I charged him $2 for a second one. Then his brother said, ‘Put him down.’ ”

But the most memorable danger was in 1980 when a high-stakes player named Tom Burgess attempted to extort $3 million from Harvey’s. He brought in a bomb set to detonate at an undetermined time; it ended up blowing a hole from the basement and up five stories.

Sandy said Burgess never received the extortion money and was sent to prison, where he died. Terry said he learned his bomb skills in one of the wars.

So prominent was this “Casino Bomber” event it’s shown on the A&E channel as “City Confidential” #131.

Ellen Sussman is a freelance writer for the Green Valley News. Contact her at ellen2414@cox.net

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