Beldon Katleman

Beldon Katleman
Born	July 14, 1914 Iowa, U.S.
Died	September 28, 1988 Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Resting place	Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery
Residence	Beverly Hills, California, U.S.
Alma mater	University of California, Los Angeles
Occupation	Businessman
Spouse(s)	Leonore Cohn
Children	Diane Katleman Deshong

Beldon Katleman (1914–1988) was an American businessman. He was the owner of El Rancho Vegas, a casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he invented the buffet for guests. He was an investor in two other casinos, the Frontier Hotel and the Silver Slipper.

Beldon Katleman was born to an affluent Jewish family on July 14, 1914 in Iowa. He graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles. His parents owned the Circle K national chain of parking lots and owned real estate in Los Angeles. During World War II, Katleman served as a lieutenant in the motion picture division of the Signal Corps in the U.S. Army.

From the late 1940s until it was destroyed by a fire in 1960, he owned and operated El Rancho Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada. In an effort to keep patrons in his casino, Katleman came up with the idea of the buffet in 1947.

With Guy McAfee and Jake Kozloff, Katleman acquired the Frontier Hotel from Bill Moore for US$5.5 million in 1951. He succeeded Kozloff as its manager in 1955.

Katleman was an investor in the Silver Slipper, another casino in Las Vegas, alongside Jack Barenfeld, Norma Friedman, Irving Leff and T.W. Richardson. After leasing it to Howard Hughes since 1968, they sued Hughes over a year's unpaid rents in 1974.

In April 1988, the Senate Revenue and Taxation Committee Senate reviewed the "murky" settlement of taxes Katleman may have owed to the state of California in the 1960s.

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