LAS VEGAS — Gloria Dea, touted as the first magician to perform on what would become the Las Vegas Strip in the early 1940s, has died. She was 100.
Dea died Saturday at her Las Vegas residence, said LaNae Jenkins, the director of clinical services for Valley Hospice, who was one of Dea’s caretakers. A memorial is being planned.Dea also appeared in several movies in the 1940s and ’50s, including “King of the Congo,” starring Buster Crabbe, in 1952.
Dea moved from California to Las Vegas in 1980. Famed magician David Copperfield befriended her in her later years, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
“Gloria was amazing. She was charming funny and engaging,” Copperfield told the newspaper. “And in Vegas, as a young magician, she started it all. It was an honor to know her.”
Dea was 19 when she performed at El Rancho Vegas on May 14, 1941.
Her show at the Roundup Room is the first recorded appearance by a magician in Las Vegas, the Review-Journal reported Sunday.
“There was no Strip, really, in those days,” Dea told the newspaper in August when she turned 100. “We had the Last Frontier and the El Rancho Vegas. They had just started building the Flamingo.”
Dea performed magic that night and more. “I also danced. I did the rumba because it was difficult to keep setting up all my magic stuff.”
After relocating to California, Dea appeared in several movies including “Mexicana” in 1945 and “Plan 9 From Outer Space” in 1957.
“I was in the Saturday matinees, for the kids,” she said. “‘Plan 9 From Outer Space’ was the worst movie of all time. … I had fun making it though.”
But that marked the end of Dea’s entertainment career. She sold insurance and then new and used cars for a dealership in the San Fernando Valley, becoming a top sales rep.
According to the Review-Journal, Dea was an only child and did not have any immediate family. Her husband Sam Anzalone, a former California car sales executive, died in January 2022.
Dea was scheduled to be inducted into the UNLV College of Fine Arts Hall of Fame on Tuesday night.
Those plans will go forward as planned; Dea will be inducted by Copperfield in a presentation before the full program.