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Las Vegas

City in Nevada, United StatesIn southern Nevada, Las Vegas sits in a basin on the floor of the Mojave Desert, in a valley with mountains to the north, south, east and west.

What it's known for

Las Vegas is famous for gambling, shows, shopping and nightlife in large casino-hotels, and it calls itself the Entertainment Capital of the World. It grew from a railroad town; when work on nearby Hoover Dam began in 1931, the workers and their families helped it through the Great Depression.

Fun facts

  1. 'Las Vegas' is Spanish for 'the meadows', a name given to the green lowlands around the springs in the valley.
  2. Most of the famous Las Vegas Strip is outside the city limits, in the unincorporated towns of Paradise and Winchester.
  3. The city was founded in 1905, when land next to the railroad tracks was sold at an auction.

Finding it on the globe

Follow Nevada's long diagonal border with California down to its southern point on the Colorado River, where it meets Arizona. Las Vegas is about 140 km north of that point.

Easy to mix up

Las Vegas is Nevada's biggest city, but the state capital is Carson City, far to the northwest near Lake Tahoe and the California border.

Sources: Wikipedia: Las Vegas, Wikipedia: Las Vegas Valley, Wikipedia: Hoover Dam, Wikipedia: Nevada, Wikipedia: Carson City, Nevada