By Larry Henry

The featured event for the MobWorld Summit this summer in Las Vegas is set.

A reception on Saturday, June 16, at the Mob Museum will serve as the highlight of the three-day Summit. The Summit kicks off on Friday, June 15, and ends on Sunday, June 17.

Richard Bryan, a former Nevada governor and U.S. senator, is scheduled to be guest of honor at the June 16 reception in the museum.

Bryan, who helped guide the state through a boom period of growth during his career as a public official and attorney, serves on the museum’s board of directors.

Officially called the National Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, the Mob Museum is housed in a former 1930s courthouse and post office downtown. The museum opened in 2012.

The museum not only houses an array of organized-crime and mob artifacts, including the barber chair that mobster Albert Anastasia was murdered in during a 1957 New York City mob hit, but the building itself has its own place in Mafia lore.

One of the Kefauver hearings into organized crime was held in the courthouse that now is home to the museum. Kefauver was a Democratic U.S. senator from Tennessee at the time of the hearings.

On Nov. 15, 1950, the Kefauver Committee, officially the U.S. Senate Special Committee to Investigate Crime in Interstate Commerce, met in the courthouse on its 14-city tour probing the mob’s criminal influence in America.

These days, the museum has become the preeminent national site not only for mob and law enforcement artifacts and displays from around the globe, but also for author readings and panel discussions on organized-crime topics.

In addition, the museum’s website features news stories, photographs and blog posts about the mob. I recently began writing a monthly blog, “The Mob in Pop Culture,” for the museum. You can view the first post by clicking here.

For our purposes, the museum is a natural fit for the featured event.

The idea for a Summit arose from a casual discussion a couple of months ago among friends in the “Las Vegas Mafia History” Facebook group and has grown from there. The purpose of the Summit is to bring people together who have an interest in Mafia history.

Everyone is welcome to attend.

Right now, the Saturday reception in the Mob Museum is set. Details on a Friday evening cocktail reception and Sunday morning gathering will be posted on two Facebook pages: “Las Vegas Mafia History” and “MobWorld.” Also, information on how to purchase tickets for the Summit this summer will be posted as soon as the entire schedule is ready.

Meanwhile, I’m looking forward to our first Summit this June in Las Vegas.

Larry Henry’s YouTube channel includes videos he shot of mob sites in Las Vegas, the apartment building in Santa Monica, California, where Whitey Bulger was arrested, and the remote Arkansas airport where Barry Seal transported drugs into the U.S for the Medellin Cartel. Subscribe HERE.