Like many sufferers of childhood epilepsy, he grew out of it with no lasting consequences. He missed so much school that he dropped out in the ninth grade - something that bothers him to this day. The violent seizures he had as a youngster left him bedridden for days at a time with ice packs to soothe his sore muscles. ![]() Harrison knows his notoriety can be an asset, so he was happy to help out when he was asked a few years back to help bring attention to epilepsy. In his down time away from the shop, he has plenty of projects to keep him busy. He purposely annoys me all day long because he knows he can get away with it. “Chumlee’s a huge part of the show,” Harrison says. And book-smart Harrison, despite his casual demeanor, has always relied on the street smarts that were partly handed down by his pop.Īnd, of course, there’s that sometimes-bumbling family chum whose real name is Austin Russell. Rick’s son, Corey, nicknamed “Big Hoss,” has shown increasing maturity and authority as he’s learned the ropes from his more experienced elders. He was a retired Navy man and lifelong hustler who played a valuable role in real life and on the show as the irascible elder, handing down his knowledge and know-how in a quiet (but sometimes cranky) manner. His father, Richard, who was known to viewers as “the Old Man,” passed away in 2018 at the age of 77. For most of the show’s run, he was the literal middle man in the family hierarchy. He says he always figured that the shop’s family dynamic would be a winning formula for a reality show. So we were always this weird pawn shop that had Super Bowl rings and Picassos.” “I realized early on that I couldn’t be Walmart, I had to be Tiffany’s. This, he reasoned, would attract attention - and more cool stuff. While many of the established corporate-owned pawn shops gave loans on bread-and-butter items like jewelry and electronics, Harrison from the start kept his eyes wide open for the interesting, rare, and unusual. They opened their pawn shop in 1989, and it was the first to have an after-hours service window. The Harrisons had a family real estate business in San Diego in the 1980s until an economic downturn caused by high interest rates prompted them to look for new opportunities in Las Vegas. Harrison and his family get away from it all on their spectacular property in the Pacific Northwest. When not at the shop or out on the road making public appearances, he slings drinks as a guest bartender once a week at Rick’s Rollin’ Smoke BBQ & Tavern, and he recently opened the doors to his Rick Harrison Collection, a high-end gallery/boutique inside the Venetian Hotel & Casino that features some of the pawn shop’s more prized acquisitions. ![]() The commerce is brisk at Gold & Silver, and Harrison and his cohorts have parlayed their success into offshoot ventures. ![]() ![]() These days, tourists shopping for souvenir shot glasses and bobble heads bump elbows with folks needing short-term loans on jewelry or seeking top dollars for cool collectibles. His soft, wheezy cackle is a reminder that Harrison’s laid-back and likable nature is a huge reason for the show’s popularity, along with its educational slant and its funny focus on family. “I was just hoping for a season or two to help out with my business,” he says before letting go of one of those quick, easy laughs that we know so well from TV. Forty more episodes being filmed now will bring the total to nearly 600 shows since it hit the airwaves in 2009. The show is in its sixteenth season and airs in 38 different languages in more than 150 countries. He actively shopped around the idea of a reality television show for four years, he says, and his efforts ultimately paid off with a jackpot as Pawn Stars became the History Channel’s most popular program. Pawn Stars: When A Reality Show Becomes Reality The affable Harrison had always been a savvy businessman with an uncanny ability to turn a fast buck, and he knew the value of media exposure, too, so he was always looking for ways to draw more customers to the oddball all-night pawn shop in Las Vegas that he ran along with his father and son.
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