Nevada’s legal brothels reopened Saturday, May 1 after being closed for more than a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic
Walter Plankinton was the creator of the Nevada Chicken Ranch in 1976
A 17 room brothel on 40 acres of land. Another building connected to the main structure by a walkway contains three decorated theme bungalows for those customers wanting a more luxurious experience.
Approx 50-60 courtesans work at the Chicken Ranch with 10 to 15 living and working there. The women usually stay for about 2 weeks a time. Ladies are independent contractors and set their own rates and services. Due to Nye County ordinances, solicitation can only be done inside the brothel.
The ranch used to display a collection of memorabilia from the original Chicken Ranch which was located outside of La Grange, Texas.
The ranch is home to the Leghorn Bar which has a separate entrance. 1978, the Chicken Ranch burned to the ground, alleged to be arson. Plankinton reopened with new trailers 5 days later.
1982, Plankinton sold the Chicken Ranch for $1,250,000 to Kenneth Green a San Francisco businessman and Russel Reade who became the manager. Around 15 women were working at the ranch at the time. Chicken Ranch Airport was an airstrip on on site which allows small aircraft to land near the brothel. February 8, 2006, the ranch accepted a purchase offer for $5.2 million.
Chicken Ranch
10511 Homestead Road
Pahrump NV 89048
Tel 775 727-5721
Tel 877 585-2397
Web Site
Email Addresses
General
Employment
Madam
Distances
8 Miles SOUTH from SR160 on Homestead Road
10 Miles from Pahrumf CENTER
64 Miles WEST of Las Vegas
83 Miles SOUTH of Beatty
315 Mile NORTH EAST of Los Angeles
Directions
From Las Vegas take US15 WEST towards Los Angeles and take EXIT 33, SR160 Blue Diamond, Pahrumf off ramp WEST. After about 50 miles look for Homestead Road, LEFT on Homestead Road to the end. You can miss the ranches on your left.
More Directions
From Las Vegas:
Interstate 15 South to Pahrump Exit #33 (HWY. 160). After 35 minutes or so, turn left on Gamebird Rd. Turn Left on Homestead Rd, drive 6 miles and we’re on the left @ 10511 Homestead.
From Los Angeles:
Take I-15 east to Baker, CA. From Baker take Hwy 127 north to Shoshone. From Shoshone, take CA HWY 178 to Pahrump. Hwy 178 turns into Nevada Hwy 372. Turn right at stoplight onto HWY 160 towards Las Vegas. Turn right on Homestead Road (Mobil station across the street). Go 8 miles and we are on the left.
Directions on PDF Printable File
Basics
The name came from the now closed Chicken Ranch in La Grange Texas. Probably the most attractive women and biggest line up for any ranch in the Las Vega area. Actually located near Pahrumf this is the closest ranch to Las Vegas. Owner Russ Reade appears to be wise to the internet and is taking advantage of it’s wide reach. The biggest competition comes from Sheri’s Ranch which is just next door. The house minimum at both ranches is $150, a few years back it was only $100. I’m told by some of the women who have worked there a while that they wills till accept $100 although rare.
Layout
Inside the line up lounge has been revamped and now the girls line up on the same wall where the door is when you enter. A full wall length mirror has been installed in the area behind where they line up. This may have been installed for several reasons, to make the room look bigger then it really is and to give you a little better visual of the line up. Line ups here have had as many as 20 women. However during our latest visit there was only one woman we would consider out of 12. They are pretty strict about permitting more then one line up, after your first and last one it’s off to the bar. Drinks are on the expensive side and tokens are now sold for alcohol.
The rest room is to the left as you enter the bar on the far wall. Women often come into the bar to play some pool or pitch a sale. This should be done more often as many women tend to be more appealing when met in a relaxed are rather then the “hold in your stomach, smile, eye ball the guy” line ups. This let em lounge with the customers seems to work well but im not sure why it’s not done more often.
Prices and Suggestions
The women at both the Chicken Ranch and Sheri’s tend to start you off with the old here’s the Menu scheme. The most popular seem to stick around the $400 per hour sessions.
Limousine service is available but comes with lots of strings attached so we suggest you make your own way out to the ranch.
It’s also suggested that you avoid peak visitor times and days for lower prices. Such at when large conventions are taking place in Las Vegas. Remember the women are independent and prices may vary. When it’s a Tuesday around noon and no one is around women are more apt to take lower bids.
Historical Threads
I recommend Stella who’s been working there for several years. She may not be the prettiest woman in the line up but her attitude and smile wins out every time. Great service, no rush and skilled at what she does, you won’t feel as if your another number or $$$ sign.
House Minimum is $150 but I was told recently by one of the girls that they would accept $100 for either one position of sex or oral.
Often you’ll find the ladies fishing for business in the bar area playing pool. The bar tender is friendly and will let you know who is working if you know her name.
The negative aspect of the Chicken Ranch is that they usually only allow (1) lineup per customer. I’ve heard that they are easing up on this silly rule. Seems they want you to decide with one look.
Pahrump, Nevada, has more than just one brothel. It’s a village of brothels, and they are even legal, administrated from the local sheriff’s office. Active prostitutes are examined weekly for common venereal diseases and monthly for aids. Nevada hasn’t had even one case of a legal prostitute with aids since the state government started demanding blood tests in 1985. It is the safest and healthiest form of paid sex in the world. It is not expensive to rent a car in California but remember to fill up the gas tank before leaving Las Vegas or Los Angeles to drive into the desert. The Nevada desert is not a nice place to run out of gasoline. But the desert landscape is fantastic to look at. Pahrump is about 100 miles (circa 160 km) from Las Vegas. Many take the trip. – I chose Sheri’s Ranch because there was a piano and because I took a liking to Robert, the lean pimp who is 63 but looks like 50. Of the girls there I’d say: there were ten of them, eight of them came from the countryside. None of them very pretty, but they were all young and full-bodied. The bartender who is also the bouncer is a friendly guy who appreciates a good talk. Even if Pahrump is a small place in the middle of the Nevada desert you’ll find first hand gossip from all over the world here. The bartender at Sheri’s Ranch is a good listener, and he meets men from all of the United States and most of the globe when they drink their way to courage before and after meeting the girls. The booze was good, the piano in tune, and the girls were not just willing but also disease free and delicately perfumed. Sheri’s Ranch is really a convenient place to spend 1000 dollars. No lice in the linen, no dirt in the bubble bath, everything is ready for a sex-tourist like you or me. Sheri’s Ranch was not the first whorehouse I visited in Pahrump. The place is part of the more expensive class of brothels in this sun-bleached desert valley where the people pretend to live off agriculture. And, yes, there are some farms here with cattle and a few hogs but every second farm has been changed into a brothel. Robert the brothel owner is a bone thing, sinewy, strong man who has seen quite a lot of the world as a sailor and adventurer. He has accepted his fate as brothel proprietor in Pahrump. He says: “Prostitution is legal in all counties in Nevada, excepting towns with more than 250.000 inhabitants. So it is illegal in Reno, but legal in Las Vegas. There are 36 brothels in Nevada, and ours is closest to Vegas.” How come prostitution has always been legal in Nevada? “The politicians just never made any law against it. Why prohibit it when there’s prostitution all over USA anyways? That’s double moral standards.” Where do the girls come from? “From all parts of the USA. But they must be 21. They do not sign any contract. Still they get paid every day according to how much they have worked. On top of that they get a percentage of the turnover. And we have both white and black girls. I take whatever shows up. They usually stay one or two weeks, and then they pass on. But if they make good money here they usually come back.” How old is Sheri’s Ranch? “We have been here since 1987, but the place has functioned as a brothel for 43 years.” Are the girls checked by a medical doctor? “Yes, every 6th day, and the clients are requested to use a condom.” How about the prices? “They are pretty much the same everywhere. It depends on the girl and what you ask her to do for you. It also depends on the tip she gets. In the end she’s the one who decides the price since she is not on any contract. I don’t have a say concerning this, and I don’t want to get involved. The client negotiates directly with the girl.” Then, how do you know how much money you’re supposed to have, and what about the Mafia? “I trust the girls, hah hah…! And I must deny all rumors that the Mafia runs the brothels in Nevada. They are run by individual enterprising men.” “The health authorities say the girls can’t leave the state as long as they work here. Otherwise we don’t know what they are doing and where. Of course they can leave any time they want, but they will have to take another medical check-up and wait for the result.” “We have between eight and thirteen girls, depending in the season. In the summertime there are customers from seven in the evening till seven in the morning because the days are so hot. But the place open round the clock.”
Chicken Ranch Brothel Finally Changes Hands
Sale Price is $5 Million
From the Pahrump Valley Times:
“Michael Fellon and Jason Mohney purchased the 40-acre property for roughly $5 million from previous owners Russ Reade and Ken Green, who have attempted to sell the business for a couple of years …
Fellon has ties to David Burgess of the Mustang Ranch close to Reno and has been involved in the Old Bridge Ranch brothel – very near the Mustang and Wild Horse ranches – for more than a decade.
Mohney owns four strip clubs in New Orleans, according to Internet sources, and is Fellon’s financial backer.”
More here.
VIDEOS
For some reason, buyers don’t flock to Chicken Ranch
Flint said the Chicken Ranch’s previous bidder underwent nine months of scrutiny by Nye County before withdrawing his brothel application “because of the length of time it was taking and the expense.”
“If you make getting a license so difficult that no one can qualify, you eventually end up with a sizeable business that is unsellable,” Flint said.
But DeMeo, the Nye County sheriff, makes no apologies for the way brothel license applicants are screened.
“This is the most privileged license in the United States of America,” DeMeo said. “Right now, these brothel applications seem to be being turned in from outside Nevada. We have to extend our reach a little bit.”
All brothel applicants are subject to a full criminal background check by the sheriff’s office and a complete examination of their finances by a forensic auditor.
The primary goal of the audit is to determine how much money the applicant has and where it came from. That’s important, DeMeo said, because of the amount of money and personal financial information that regularly changes hands at a brothel.
“Criminals actually use brothels and prostitution to fund their criminal enterprises,” DeMeo said. “We have to make sure the person is above board and won’t cause us any problems.”
Barb Brents is a sociology professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas who has authored a number of articles on Nevada’s legal brothel industry.
Brents said she is surprised the Chicken Ranch hasn’t sold, “because it’s got the name, because it’s close to Las Vegas and because of the success of Sheri’s” Ranch brothel next door.
issues with financing.
“Banks don’t loan for these kinds of businesses in the same way they do for others,” Brents said.
That leaves brothel owners to invest their own capital or find backers who don’t mind pouring money into a controversial industry that could be wiped out of existence on a whim by state lawmakers or county officials. Flint said owning a brothel isn’t as lucrative as it used to be, either, thanks in large part to rampant prostitution in Las Vegas. “The brothels can’t compete with that, and it’s too big for Metro to snuff out,” Flint said. “We have competition we never had before. It isn’t a gold mine any longer.”
The Chicken Ranch’s latest suitor was Dallas businessman Bruce Kahn.
DeMeo said Kahn didn’t provide some financial records and other documents requested by investigators. As a result, DeMeo said his office declared Kahn “not financially suitable” at the end of its 125-hour investigation and recommended his application be denied.
NEWS STORIES
Chicken Ranch fire ripples through Nye County, region
Chicken Ranch takes hold just outside Pahrump town border
Have an extra $4.5 million? Nevada’s Chicken Ranch Brothel for sale
Prostitutes could become co-owners of Pahrump brothel
Lawsuit aims to end prostitution in Nevada
Nevada’s Dennis Hof looks to sell a brothel in Crystal, purchase Chicken Ranch in Pahrump area
Advocates, 2 women sue in bid to close Nevada legal brothels
For some reason, buyers don’t flock to Chicken Ranch
Documentary visits the Chicken Ranch
DOCUMENTARY ABOUT A BROTHEL
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