Daily independent. [volume] (Elko, Nev.) 188?-1915, 1894-04-18
SLOT GAMBLING.
How It Is Carried on in the Saloons
or the City.
Schemes OF Cunning Men to Beat the
Eickel-DevourlnR Devices ImmenNe
PrOfits Realized by Saloon
Keepers.

Chimes" said Chicago bartender re-
ferring to the nicl<el-inathe-slot ma
chine. They are the greatest intro
duccrs you ever saw. Why, / have
seen men who had never met before
get we'll acquainted with one another
before they got through playing. 1
heard of q case up on Blue Island ave-
nue. where follow was dropping his
nicllels into the slot. He had been
playing for twenty minutes or more
when another man walked up to the
machine. The two fell to talking
about chances of winning at the game.
The conversation then took a wider
range. and in the course of an hour it
developed that the men were cousins.
They had not met before in eighteen
years
The machines provoke trouble as
we'll as mcrriment," the bartender con-
tinued. up in the saloon at Noble
and IngrahGm streets Il Pole dropped
nickel after nickel into n mrchine I'M
til he had pil:ed away dollar or more.
Finally coin went right. One of the
doors flew open and the gambler thrust
his hand into the receptacle, expect
ing. of course, to get some of his own
sortunates. Besides the nickel which
had sprung open the door the Pole
found four suspender buttons. He
raved and tore about the place and
threatened to break the glassware
The bartender called q policeman and
the fellow was taken to the station.
Who plays the machines? All classes
of men. l have seen business men drop
five dollars worth of niclsels into a ma
chine ut one standing without getting
SO much as penny in return. Then,
like enough, some old skate with
case nickel would drop in, spring the
door and take all the money. But the
machines are a good thing for the
house. The percentage is SO big that
il is an object to have them in the
place, TO matter if they do take up
deal of space. Most of the prOprietors
buy the contrivanccs outright in order
to get eli the rake-off. There is one
place in town where the owner has
nine machines of different patterns.
His winnings for one week paid for
three of them. When he counted mp
Oil saturday night he found that his
share of the investment of his patrons
was one hundred and twenty-scvcn
dollars in nickels, and that is not recl1-
oning what the players spent ut the
bar. think, though, that the time is
coming when the machines will be
recognized as gambling devices pure
and simple, and rs such become n mat
| ter for police attention. But they are
| good substitute for the pol1er-room,
which. as everybody knows, is thrifty
| adjunct TO any saloon.
! DO players attempt to open the
| money boxes by tampcring with the
machines?" repeated the saloon keeper
to u Herald reporter. "Wcl1, should
say so. Wires, nails. buttons, beer
checks and metal of the same weight
and size OF Il nickel are used, but they
seldom work. The most successful
| schemes for breaking machines with
| pegs is to lie string through 81 hole
| bored in nickel and then drop the
coin into the slot, it's course being gov
crned by the hanl of the operator.
One sharp fellow got q hap of money
out of our machines by slipping a
nickel into the slot and then tracing it
into the receptacles by means of pow.
erful magnet which he held against
tho glass. heard later that he worked
the same game in other places end
TINT his winnings amounted t. many
hundreds of dollars. If the glass had
been Theoretically scaled to the frame
work it would have been impossible
for the magnet to influence the coins
The patentees now provide against tlri!
sort OF trickery, and the machines, q;
they stand to-day. are almost invulner
able to manipulators. But the time
will come when some smart follow vii
get UP n continuance which will upse
MI the precautions taken by the max
crs and give him access TO the vaults o
al the machines in town"
THE average term in school days To-
the union is 100.
New JERSEY has the LONGEST soboo