Fred Dakota was a businessman who founded the first full-scale Native American casino in the United States.Dakota was out of work in the 1980s when he had the idea to open a small casino in his brother-in-law’s two-car garage.
They lived in the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where bingo was already legal. When Dakota applied with the tribal council for a gambling license, they agreed, and he began remodeling the garage into a casino.
After building a bar and blackjack tables, and buying a craps table and poker machines, Dakota opened The Pines on New Years’ Eve 1983 to great success.
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