Posted on: October 24, 2025, 02:12h.
Last updated on: October 24, 2025, 02:24h.
- When it opened, eight fountain statues greeted guests as they entered the original MGM Grand
- The statues were in place on Nov. 21, 1980 — the day of the worst hotel fire in the US
- The fountain was removed during a renovation sometime in the late 1980s or early ’90s
- Today, the property stands as the Horseshoe Casino
They were meant to greet guests as they entered the old MGM Grand, the largest hotel in the world at the time. And they did that well. But they also witnessed one of the darkest days in Las Vegas history.
Forty-four years after the MGM Grand fire on Nov. 21, 1980, three of the property’s original eight fountain statues greeted Las Vegas antique dealer Jeff Young as he walked into a backyard. They belonged to William Hunter, a former engineering director for Bally’s — as the original MGM Grand was known from 1986 through 2022.
Hunter died in September 2024, and a real-estate friend of Young’s was selling his house, and its contents, on behalf of Hunter’s only surviving heir, a daughter.
It was a time capsule,” Young told Casino.org. “It was just great walking into it. I mean, there were rolls of MGM carpet from the ‘70s in his workshop. He had taken planters with palms, slot machines.
“His whole house was a casino.”
The statues were mounted on bases around Hunter’s pool in the backyard. His daughter knew exactly what they were, so they didn’t come cheap. On the bottom of the cherub, etched in handwriting, was “Fuse Marinelli Firenzi,” Italian for “cast by Marinelli in Florence.”
They’re bronzes from the Ferdinando Marinelli Artistic Foundry in Italy, which specializes exclusively in bronze casting using a traditional lost-wax technique dating back to the Renaissance.
“I paid a lot is all I will say,” Young said.
Monumental Photo
Dee Ennis was the freelance photographer who captured the statues in the main image illustrating this article. Then 35 years old, Ennis had just gotten off work as a refrigeration technician on the graveyard shift at Las Vegas City Hall. News of the fire came over his car’s AM radio.
Since the camera he used to shoot a wedding the day before was still in the back seat, Ennis drove straight for the MGM Grand instead of home. He had to park dozens of blocks away. Though most looky-loos got turned away, Ennis cleared the checkpoints because he knew many of the first responders from city hall.
“I was a friend of the sheriff’s,” Ennis said. “Plus, I was still wearing my city employee uniform, so I guess that made me part of the response.”
Ennis circled the perimeter, snapping photos as he walked. A Vietnam veteran, he was accustomed to human tragedy and acted reflexively, just as he did in the Air Force. Still, emotion occasionally overwhelmed him.
“The fires under the portico and the burned-out car in valet parking were unreal, unbelievable,” he said. “Also, the bravery of the helicopter pilots landing on the MGM roof and braving the smoke and confusion was really heroic.”
The tragedy claimed the lives of 87 people. Only the Winecoff Hotel fire, which killed 119 on Dec. 7, 1946, in downtown Atlanta, was worse. Those helicopter pilots, from nearby Nellis Air Force Base, snatched more than 1,000 hotel guests off the roof. Had they not, the death toll might have surpassed the Winecoff fire.
Sixty-four of the 87 victims died on floors 19-24 of the hotel tower — half in their rooms from inhaling the thick black smoke and carbon monoxide that poured through the air conditioning ducts, and accumulated into a dense cloud. Many of the victims were likely still asleep in their beds.
Aftermath
The old MGM Grand unceremoniously reopened on July 29, 1981. Four years later, it was sold to Bally Manufacturing and rebranded in 1986 as Bally’s Las Vegas. After a series of ownership changes, the company that became Caesars Entertainment took control in 1998, rebranding Bally’s as Horseshoe Las Vegas in December 2022, which aligned it with one of its legacy gaming brands.
Sometime in the late ‘80s or early ‘90s, the old MGM Grand fountain was dismantled as part of one of Bally’s renovations. Hunter took three of its statues home from work.
To start them on their journey to their next home, Jeff Young enlisted four of his employees to help heave them into his pickup. (The mermaids weighed about 400 lbs. each, the cherub about 300.)
Young also purchased two Bally’s-branded slot machines, two brass MGM lion’s head door pulls, some room number placards, and assorted other memorabilia.
Young says he has no plan for the statues yet, though the Neon Museum just called him on Friday and expressed interest.
That would be great,” he said. “I really just want to find a good home for them, ideally in Las Vegas, where someone will appreciate them.”
