Born on November 19, 1914 and passed away on November 2, 1978[1], Dino Cellini managed casinos for Meyer Lansky, a notorious mobster from New York, in Havana, Cuba during the late 1950s and the early 1960s. Later, Cellini operated casinos in the Bahamas and the United Kingdom.
The son of an Italian immigrant barber, Dino Vicente Cellini was born in the U.S. He had three brothers – Edward, Goffredo & Bobby, and one sister, Julia. Cellini spent his childhood in Steubenville, Ohio, a steel mill town, during the years of the Depression. In his early years, he worked as a dice/craps dealer and croupier at Rex’s Cigar Store alongside Dean Martin, who was then known as Dean (Dino) Crocetti.
In this period, numerous tobacconists in Steubenville served as facades for organized crime activities such as bookmaking, numbers games, pool, illicit drinking, and unlawful gambling. Steel factory employees from Steubenville and the neighboring Youngstown, Ohio, would often visit these establishments after work, spending their scant wages on such amusements. The most popular games in these venues were Craps and Barboot, a Greek dice game. The gambling dens would employ “mechanics”, experts at manipulating dice and cheating, to oversee their craps games. The mechanic’s role was to deter unwelcome patrons, interrupt the winning streaks of fortunate customers, and hustle those with substantial money to squander. Cellini was renowned for his proficiency with dice and ultimately became the youngest “bust out” man in Steubenville.
