The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1906-09-30
GAMBLING AS A PROFESSION
Many of the Biggest Players Win
Fortunes in Their Lifetime and
Die in the Poorhouse.
(ChIcago Tribune.)

| INTO the business or establishing a card
| gambling house under modern condi-
/ tons is to attempt one Of the riskiest
! businesses in the world. Recently one
of the most noted gaming house keep
| ers in the, country seems to have sug-
gested further anomaly I'm the stu
alton in his utterance in court of rec
ord:
When 1 conduct house on. a 10 per
cent basis of profit IL is only matter
of time until my steady patron goes
broke"
In the face of this statement. how
ever. the innocent layman may be still
further at sea when it is recalled by old
habitues of the gaming table that near
ly every gambling king of modern his
tory has finished close to the poorhouse
and the -potter,s field, How is it posi-
bic that the gambler with the insidious,
certain 10 per cent which Inevitably
wrecks the man who goes often enough
TO the green table almost invariably
dies in poverty?
Today II is the gambler king who at
least has an ephemeral show to gain
fieeting riches. But i'm order that these
riches shall approach riches as they
are measured in other businesses the
man who opens the gambling house
must have a fortune for the invest
ment. His outlawed business itself will
make il certain that he pays the maxi
mum rental or the highest price for the
property which he chooses for occupan-
cy. To sustain this he Will need 10. seek.
out the wealthy patron who not only
/ has money TO lose, but who may have a
certain influence which may tend to-
ward immunity for keeper and player
alike. The establishment will need
to have the best cuisine and the best
cellars, with palatial furnishings and
a retinue of servants in full, keeping.
! And somewhere money will be ueces-
sars in binding officials TO the exist
ence Of an institution which is visible
to the merest tyro in passing2 a4ohgothe
street. 1851
A constitution of iron. the absence of
a nervous system, the discrimination of
a King Solomon, and the tact of a dip
lomat are requisites for the successful
! gambler king. Considering the quail
! fication of the man for such a place
and the firal ending of the gambler
kings career, it might be a sociological
study worth while to determine where.
on a more worthy bent such capacities
/ in a man might land him.
| In real life, however, ii must be adj
mitted that the gambling. king is, looked
| upon in exaggerated light Almost
without exception the big gambler is
posing always. Conventionafityt has de-
manded it of him. But far more than
! this, in order to command the follow
ing which he desires, he must have a
| certain social side which is not too
prominent, but which with tact and
! judgment he may bring out on dress
parade. To the layman the gambler
is the dark, sinister figure pictured i'm
melodrama He bears the same reIa-
ton to gambling that Simon Legree
bears to the institution of slavery of
fifty years ago.
One of the noted gamblers Of his time
| in this country passed from laboring
on the docks into the prize ring. When
! his ring work was ended the gambling
| house was an easy step onward in IL
] legitimate fields. On the docks his rep
utation was not above a bit of Strong
| arm" work in separating a man from
the money which the dock walioper
wanted. Naturally, under the Queens
/ berry rules, there We're things I'm the
ring which he could not do in uVercom-
/ ing an antagonist and he learned to
make concessions to fairness-whieh
| was education. - IT
Opening a gambling house that was
adapted to the wants Of a rich clientele
| it was necessity that he preserve this
educated regard for his patrons and
| that he should add to II. Soon he was
| In position where ii was imperative
that his reputation for fair dealing be
kept intact. He became the gentle
man gambler" whose word carried
all the accepted concomitants of his
gentleman's business. In the course
of events he attained high legislative
office under the government But il
may be said for those who knew the
man as a man not one ever ceased to
| regard him at heart as the dock wal
! loper, with the inherent and .unrecon-
structed disposition to regard other
men as legitimate prey. Had other
! conditions and circumstances made a
card sharp of him, he would have held
to the promptings Of his nature
In the conduct Of a gambling house
of the first class, the gambler king
| needs for himself and for his patrons
| the assurance of uninterrupted play
/ Men Of money and position will not go
to house where there is menace of
police raid. The small gambler may
subsidize the policeman on the beat
| in which the house stands, but he can
not placate the whole police depart
ment. And even when it is thought
that the gambler king is impregnable
in his castle some one may break over
| the barriers and raid the place in the
name OF law and order.
Within a few years New York. has
given to the world some of the inside
workings of the gambling business.
1 w llCli OClOillC lnC pace VI places
! which had" been considered immune.
the proprietor OF the house was con-
sidered worth S1,0e0,000. Before the lit
igation was done and the fine paid the
king gambler was out $500, 900, his CLUB
| houses" We're closed and he had been
branded officially as a common gam
bier, pursued In the courts for pay
ment OF lawyers fees which he desig-
mated as outrageous and a "shrieking
scandal" Yet this man was of the
type whose word had been declared as
good SIS his bond.
The dice, faro and roulette are the
principal games of the gambling house,
and considering these the experienced
player will tell you that he is suspicious.
OF a .>petey" i'm the dice box, high
layout" in faro and a squeezed
wheel in roulette in just the proper
| ton that the gambling house Keeper