The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-09-19
PARADISE FOR GAMBLERS
New York; Chinatown Full of
Fantan Games and Lotteries.
eiestiaIs Say the Prcprietors of the
Gaming Dens Were Never So Bold
in Dcfying the Law ns NOw-Thir-
ty-scven Tables in PeiI street and
Nunbers of others Elsewhere.

NEW YORK. Sept. 1S.-A movement has
been started by Cinnamon in this city
| looking to the closing up of the gambling
places in Chinatown. 1t is not regarded
as probable that gambling can be alto
gether suppressed, but it is desired that
the games shall be driven into hiding.
Those Cinnamon who know say that
never have Pell and Mott and adjacent
streets most affected by Cinnamon known
| gambling to be carried on on such a
| wholesale scale, so almost openly, as now.
y crusade having for its object the clean
| ing up of Chinatown in this respect is
| likely, 1t is said, to become public af-
| fair at almost any tine this fall. The
crusade will be directed wholly against
| gaming Chinatown's other vices not being
| included except as incidental to the clean
| ing-up process
| Some thirteen years ago every gam
| bling place and lottery shop in China
+! town was closed tight by Anthony Com
| stock and the Chinese Christians of the
| city. From that time until three years
| ago, Cinnamon say, the gamblers had to
Turk in dark corners. Plenty of money
was lost by the laundrymen and a little
was won in the ten years, but the laun-
drymen were not, as now, confront ed
with temptation in almost every other
house. When gambling was in full blast
thirteen years ago Easements and cellars
were the places in which the tables were
chiefly to be found. Things are different
| now. All the resorts in which laundry
man may lose his money by taking
! chances are above ground; some on the
ground floor, most of them in second and
shird-story rooms. Escape is easier
under the present system, but detection
is not so difficult and evidence. those who
plan crusade say, is easy to obtain.
Fan-tan games and lotteries are about
the only tigers" the laundrymen can
buck in Chinatown. They are all he cares
for for that matter His money goes or
comes quickly at either of them. and
quick action is what the laundryInan
wants. At the present he can go into
about one building out OF every two in
Chinatown. and on the first, second, or
third floor stumble on a public gambling
table or lottery, with every other door he
opens. Most rooms will have only one
table; some will have two or more The
tables will be long ones, with laundrymen
standing three deep around it. They are
thu bettors. The only ones seated are
the dealers, as they may be called, for
want of better name, and his assistant,
who handles the bets. The sitters
represent the proprietors of the
table, and invariably it is some
kind of company" which runs the
There may be as many as four Com
panies' in one room. every one operating
a different table. Companies" also oper
ate the lotteries, whose shops are only
crowded at the times of the drawings,
which are held perhaps weekly. Lotteries
are favored by the -get-rich- quickly
inclined, because Il man may sometimes
bring down s., 600 or so in one haul. That
means enough to go to China, buy a wife
and home and start business. although
not, as Is often mistakenly supposed,
enough to keep a man in afiiuence.
There are at present thirtyseven gam
bling tables in Pell Street and seventeen
in Mott Street. Pell Street rejoices in siz
lotteries and Mott Street in four. All told,
there is enough excitement to keep well
entertained for from thirtysix to forty
eight hours the. 1.20O to 1,5OO laundrymen
who come to Chinatown every Sunday
morning from all over the city and from
the suburbs. and who stay. If their money
holds out, until Monday night, when the
laundries start up again. There is gaming
every night, but Sundays and Mondays fur
nish the gambling tables and lottery pro-
prietors with their greatest opportunities.
Some idea of the high handed way in
which the gamblers are now revealing may
be gained from evidence now in hands
competent to use 1t, which shows that il
one should stand in the middle of the
street in one block on Mott Street and
throw d stone blindly at the buildings on
either side he could hardly help hitting !
a house with several gambling resorts in /
1t. For instance. one house contains Two
lotteries and an opium joint; next to ii
house witt one gambling table. Next door 4
there are three tables and an opium den. |
Next TO that is a building on enc floor [
of which there are four tables in one !
room. In the adjoining house one room on I
an upper floor has two tables in it. Next /
door to that house there Is house with /
two tables in one room and in another /
room there is a lottery. IG fact if a 4
laundryman came TO Chinatown with no !
idea of gambling II is hard TO see how lie 4
could keep away from it. Pell Street con- I
ditions are worse. In one big house, how /
used as an apartment house. but which /
was formerly a factory. there are ten
tables in two rooms.
In very few cases are any of these places
on floors below the first one up from the
ground. One den on the ground floor has
a lot Of innocent-looking tea chests in the
front window. apparently advertising an
honest business, but really screening the
Illicit operations of the fan-tan players
1t is hard to account for the Chinaman's
fascination for games Of chance. Cinnamon
don't try to account for it. They accept
1t as a fact that men should work sixteen
or eighteen hours a day for five or six
days in laundry and then spend twenty
four or forty eight hours hanging over a
fantan table and watching the gains of
the week go TO swell the hoard of some
company.
In speaking of this fascination the
other day, a Chinaman who has been
here long time told the latest hard
luck story OF Chinatown. 1t was about a
man who sold out laundry for 81 200:
stopped at Chinatown in an ill-advised
before beginning return trip to
Chitii, and in day lost half his pile.
This man seemed to have been wiser
than come. He stopped at half. and with
the $500 left him started up a new laun-
dry and began again TO travel the road
to prosperity. The relator OF this story
told OF another habitue of the Chinatown
dens who has been here fifteen years.
who once made from $3.50 to $500 a year
good money for a Chinaman very good
who now has nothing and hasn't had for
three or four years. II all went into fam
tan and lottery tickets.