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Shell Game Hustle, Along the Embarcadero
Cheating the rubes and the suckers has been a part of San Francisco since its begining. By 1850 there were several hundred gambling dens in the city. Many miners saw the results of their months of back-breaking labor wiped away in one night by cheats, card-sharps, and just bad luck. Ordinary bets ranged from fifty cents to ten dollars but the stakes often had no limit. One unlucky gambler, Ed Moses lost $200,000 in a single night of gambling. Professional gambler Jim Rynders noted that San Francisco gambling houses would routinely accept bets for amounts too large for the grandest European casinos to cover. The most popular games were monte, faro, rondo, roulette, rouge et noir, and a early version of blackjack, poker being relatively unknown in San Francisco at that time. A few blocks away a second gambling culture thrived. Chinese gambling dens operated day and night with games of fan tan, mahjong, and pák kòp piú, a kind of lottery.
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MAP D-15 ]
3 Comments:
I couldn't resist but try to figure out how much Ed Moses' $200K was worth back in 1850.
I found a calculator online that estimated the amount in today's dollars to be $1,082,882.88
I love walking down the alleys in Chinatown and hearing the click of mahjong tiles behind closed doors and windows.
Amazing that this would be going on right out in the open -- and even more amazing that people would be lined-up ready to part with their cash...
The scam artist used three plastic bottle caps and a cardboard box so the that whole operation could instantly disappear if the police showed up.
Taking this photo got me a threat and two onlookers (apparently shills) quietly pushed me out of the circle.
But in the two minutes that I was there I saw a $100 bet lost and a $200 bet lost. Of course the crowd would cheer when the shills 'won' - unbelievable.
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