Michael Boettcher, founder, Storm International
Michael Boettcher, the founder of casino operator Storm International, left school at 18, having attended six schools since the age of 11. “There were a lot of changes around that time and I also spent a year in Germany as a 12-year-old,” he told InterGaming. “Later I obtained a place at Goldsmith’s College to train to be a teacher, but I failed my A-levels. “So I worked in a travel agency and as an airline reservations agent for Alitalia for about three years, before becoming a mini-cab driver for a while. Of course, I was looking to do something else, but didn’t know what.” He saw an advertisement in the London Evening Standard for a croupier’s job at Charlie Chester’s casino in Soho. He got the job. “That was in 1971 and I was 24. There were some truly unsavoury characters around the casinos at that time and I remember seeing many infamous people there, including the Kray twins.” After a few months in the job and having learned blackjack and roulette, Boettcher realised that “this was not the most challenging job but it was fun.” He heard about the possibility of being able to move on as a dealer and made some inquiries. He went to work at the Playboy Club which, he says, was “the place to be” at the time. “All the famous people of the time played there, including Peter O’Toole, Sean Connery, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Telly Savalas, Clint Eastwood and many others.”
Read the full article in the July issue of InterGaming.
