ISBN 978-1-952320-07-1 (Paperback)
The Bravest Hunter
Copyright © 2020 Michael E. Newell
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The first of all qualities (of a commander) is courage.”
—Maurice de Saxe, Memoirs Concerning the Art of War
Foreword
by Jonathan Rhodes Regional Service Manager at Everi
When I was eighteen, I worked in a tribal casino in Alabama. I noticed each of the Class II gaming machines had computers in them. I was talented with the use of technology so, I instantly put in my application to the company and eventually joined that team. During my time at the casino, I took an interest in MGAM’s product and began thinking more about a career there rather than just having a job.
I worked with the MGAM techs and learned their product, then approached Multimedia Games for a technician position, and as I hoped, it led to my future career.
When MGAM offered the job, I researched the company and especially the founder, Gordon Graves. After seeing Mr. Graves’s portfolio and accomplishments, it was a no-brainer. I took the job. As I write this, I am thirty-six years of age and still with the company Mr. Graves founded and built from the ground up.
As a young man, I was always fascinated by Mr. Graves as it seemed everything he touched turned to gold. He is a brilliant leader and such a compassionate person, a combination I’ve rarely seen in the business world. During the years Mr. Graves was actively leading the company, he always seemed to put the right people in the right job, and so the company kept growing. Later, MGAM sold for more than a billion dollars.
I wish I could have been beside Mr. Graves seven days a week to have soaked up as much knowledge as possible from him. Mr. Graves has touched thousands of lives as a supplier of a superior product that made money for its clients and for the thousands more who Mr. Graves put on a career path. Mr. Graves solidified my future in this industry by starting the company. After all, I was just a teenage boy from a small town in Alabama who did not know what I was going to do with my life.
I often wonder what Mr. Graves thinks about his business ventures. In America today, things are usually about the mighty dollar, but I honestly believe Mr. Graves gets a thrill from creating these jobs and paving the road for many, many people like me.
In the gaming industry, there are so many bumpy roads, red tape, regulations, legal matters and tons more that go into starting a company like Multimedia Games. It just shows the sheer brilliance of Mr. Graves. For him to take an idea and turn it into what he has, takes more than I could ever imagine. In this industry, it’s not “just get a product and go.” There is so much more to it, and it blows my mind how Mr. Graves does things like this.
It is essential to note that Mr. Graves does not merely create minimum-wage jobs; he creates life-changing careers. As I have previously said, he has given me a career that I thank God for every day. I no longer need to check my bank balance or worry about finances. I honestly attribute everything I have to Mr. Graves, and I hope that one day he creates a new company that I can be a part of in order to further the skill sets that I have built over the years.
Incredibly, Mr. Graves armed the tribes with the weapons by way of high-earning Class II games they needed to force the states to negotiate compacts1 with tribes allowing them to run Class III games, just like Las Vegas casinos.
Mr. Graves retired twice, first when he left MGAM, then again after he started an amusement games company called Aces Wired in Texas and settled his legal battle with Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. He was seventy-four. A close associate of Mr. Graves, David Hatton, past president of Chickasaw Enterprises, said, “Gordon was not just retiring, he was preparing to die.” Then Mr. Graves met his wife, Linda, and regained a new zest for life.
Throughout my career at Multimedia, which is now known as Everi, I often brag to people when Mr. Graves’s name comes up. I am one of the lucky ones able to say I worked with him and continue to work for his legacy. To this day, I still follow Mr. Graves and imagine what might come next. Mr. Graves is a great man and very solid. I, and many others, would follow Mr. Graves on any business venture, as we know it will be a success.
1. Compacts are agreements, or treaties, with Indian Tribes
Preface
In the early 1800s, thirty million buffalo roamed the Great Plains. By the later 1800s, after serving as the primary source of food and supplies for the American Indians, most of the buffalo succumbed to U.S. government-mandated elimination that effectively destroyed the most important food and material resource of the Plains Indian people. As a result, the tribes had little choice but to move onto reservations, effectively ending their traditional way of life.
The American Indian’s plight was unique. Unlike that of other impoverished people, the Indian was a prisoner and forbidden from roaming freely and hunting as they had for millennia. Impoverished non-Indian people pinned their hopes on their hard labor lifting them out of poverty and offering them the promise of their children gaining a life-changing education. The Indians, conversely, were hopeless.
Opportunely, Native Americans later discovered that they could sustain themselves with gambling. First were the Seminoles in Florida, with self-regulated, high-stakes bingo games. The Seminoles fought an intense legal battle for their right to manage their affairs concerning gaming all the way to the Supreme Court.2 The decision, in favor of the tribe, established that tribes could operate games that were legal according to state laws and self-regulate such games under their own rules, outside of state regulations. As a result, bingo became a very different game featuring high-stake prizes and was no longer reminiscent of small bingo games run in church basements.
With the Seminoles’ victory in 1984, other tribes soon followed their example. Consequently, local law enforcement in California challenged the rights of the Cabazon tribe to operate high-stakes bingo, citing California as a Public Law 280 state,3. In their view, gaming on the Indian reservation constituted an illegal activity.
The tribe hired Glen Feldman, an attorney who specialized in Indian law, whose defense helped secure the Supreme Court ruling in 1987,4 then dubbed the “Cabazon Case.” Today, the Cabazon decision represents the most significant piece of case law responsible for establishing the legal foundation for Indian gaming law, which transformed impoverished and scattered tribes into economic powerhouses.
Ultimately, the Indians had discovered what John James, Chairman of the Cabazon tribe in California, called the “new buffalo.” The new buffalo was gaming, and Gordon Graves was The Greatest Hunter. Graves led the pursuit of the new buffalo by first designing a platform to interlink many tribal bingo halls across a wide area network to operate a high-stakes, million-dollar bingo game in real-time. As a result, more and more tribal gaming operations joined