Atlantic City in the 1980s and ‘90s was a hotbed of competition. With a new casino coming on every year throughout the early ’80 and players being courted by every casino in the later part of the decade, Atlantic City developed a coterie of casino executives who were unique and inventive and who later went on to lead the industry. People like Terry Lanni, Jim Allen, Phil Satre, Steve Hyde, Mark Etess, Peter Boynton, Marc Schorr, Arte Nathan, Rudy Preito, Roger Wagner, Dennis Gomes and many others were instrumental in the success of Atlantic City in those days. But one of those who charisma, understanding of the business, and simply humanity set himself apart from all others, Willard “Bucky” Howard, died last week.
Although he cut his teeth in the casinos of Nevada—his father was the surveillance manager at Binion’s Horseshoe and they were both good friends with Jack Binion—it wasn’t until he arrived in Atlantic City that he began to shine. Like Steve Wynn, who employed Howard for a while at the Atlantic City Golden Nugget, the Boardwalk brought out the best in Howard. He was energized by the ultra-competitive market in Atlantic City and became a leader in the market where the next great marketing idea was giving bus customers $10 in quarters instead of t $5 your neighbors did.
Starting at the Tropicana, Howard worked for several Atlantic City properties, including the Golden Nugget, the Showboat and Trump’s Castle and Taj Mahal.
But Howard’s legacy lies with the influence that he had on young gaming executives who still revere him to this day.
Phil Juliano, now an executive with Twin Rivers, called him the “coolest, hippest guy who ever came to Atlantic City from Las Vegas.”
“He became the Pied Piper of Atlantic as everyone who wanted to be somebody in the casino business wanted to be like Bucky,” said Juliano. “He understood the board room as well as the avid gambler. He could talk to the political heavyweights and the break-in dealer, as well. In the early days of Atlantic City, Bucky define effective leadership to the ordinary employee who was just starting out in the business. If they had any questions or doubts about what they had just gotten into, the answer was always the same: Talk to Bucky.”
Facebook was full of tributes to Howard. Glenn Lillie, a longtime casino executive who worked with Howard at the Trop, said he was an expert in a wide variety of disciplines.
“But Bucky was ‘in charge’ of the most pivotal part of the whole engine—casino operations. I spent several decades in the business and was blessed to work with some of the finest, hard-working, creative folks I’ve ever known, and W. ‘Bucky’ Howard was in a class of his own. The man ‘knew the games, and he knew the ‘game,’ like none other.”
