Old Western Poker Table

An 1864 Poker Saloon Table, ORIGINAL, all these photo's taken at The Museum of the Mountain West, all artifacts and original and are absolutely... more

by Janice Pariza

Title

Old Western Poker Table

Artist

Janice Pariza

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

An 1864 Poker Saloon Table, ORIGINAL, all these photo's taken at The Museum of the Mountain West, all artifacts and original and are absolutely amazing, well worth the trip to Montrose, Colorado! A lot of famous Westerns were shot here, Butch Cassidy, Katie Elder, John Wayne movies. A Journey through time.
Whether on a riverboat atop the Mighty Mississippi, or in the smoky dimness of a mining camp saloon, a lucky draw could turn a broken man into a winner. In the days of the frontier west, poker was king with the mustachioed likes of Wild Bill Hickok, Doc Holliday, "Canada� Bill Jones, Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, and hundreds of others.

In the old west towns of Deadwood, Dodge City, Tombstone, and Virginia City, gamblers played with their back to the wall and their guns at their sides, as dealers dealt games with names such as Chuck-A-Luck, Three Card Monte, High Dice, and Faro, by far the favorite in the wild west saloons.
The exact origin of poker is unknown but many have speculated that it originated from a 16th century Persian card game called As Nas. Played with a 25 card deck containing five suits, the rules were similar to today�s Five Card Stud. Others are of the opinion that it was invented by the Chinese in 900 A.D. In all likelihood, the game derived from elements of various gambling diversions that have been around from the beginning of time.

Poker in the United States was first widely played in New Orleans by French settlers playing a card game that involved bluffing and betting called Poque in the early 1800's. This old poker game was similar to the "draw poker� game we play today. New Orleans evolved as America�s first gambling city as riverboat men, plantation owners and farmers avidly pursued the betting sport.

The first American gambling casino was opened in New Orleans around 1822 by a man named John Davis. The club, open twenty-four hours a day, provided gourmet food, liquor, roulette wheels, Faro tables, poker, and other games. Davis also made certain that painted ladies were never far away. Dozens of imitators soon followed making the gaming dens the primary attraction of New Orleans. The city's status as an international port and its thriving gambling industry created a new profession, called the card "sharper."

Professional gamblers and cheats gathered in a waterfront area known as "the swamp," an area even the police were afraid to frequent, and any gambler lucky enough to win stood a good chance of losing his earnings to thieves outside of the gambling rooms and saloons.
Gambling was outlawed in the rest of the huge Louisiana territory in 1811, but New Orleans continued to enjoy the prosperity brought by gambling for more than 100 years. Though the law was passed for the entire Louisiana Purchase, it was obviously not enforced and casinos and gambling began to spread.

As commerce developed on the waterways, gambling traveled up the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, then westward via covered wagons, and later on the railroad. The first written reference in the United States came from Jonathan H. Greer in 1834 when he referred to the amusement as the "cheating game.�

Uploaded

February 18th, 2014