In the winter of 1873-’74, the legislature passed another anti-gambling law which was supplemented by sundry municipal ordinances. A lively crusade against the faro games was at once commenced, but as the only penalties imposed consisted of light fines, the games usually reopened immediately.
The persistent raiding by the police, eventually compelled many of the games to close, among others, that of Col. Gamble, who started a roadside sporting house on the San Jose road, fourteen miles down the peninsula. For a time the place prospered greatly. During several years, it being[being] a favorite resort for stock-brokers, bankers and merchants, who had not entirely overcome their old time sporting proclivities.[proclivities.] “Bill” Briggs was the last of the old timers to surrender to the law. He continued to run a faro game behind strong barricades, until at last he too retired in disgust and public gaming in San Francisco was dead. Since then numerous games—chiefly[chiefly] “brace”—have sprung up, but the capital behind them has been very limited and a few raids by the police have forced them to close. At present there are two faro games in operation in the city; White’s (not kept by the person of that name previously mentioned), and Lawrence’s. The former has the name of being a “square” game, but the “limit” is twenty dollars and the house is frequented only by sporting men, its patrons being bartenders, habitues of pool-rooms, “macquereaux” and men of that class. The other game, either justly or unjustly, is often spoken of as a “brace” game where “steerers” are employed to “rope in” greenhorns. It occupies several rooms in different buildings, moving from one to the other as expediency dictates, and the police have a hard time in locating it as the game will be run in one place one night, and another the next.
In the early days of San Francisco poker was unheard of. In the mad rush of those times men could not sit still long enough to play poker or any other similar game; they must needs stake their all on the turn of a single card, or on one whirl of the wheel. With the decline of the banking games, however, poker leaped into favor, and many were the elegant quarters fitted up in the upper stories of buildings in the central part of the town, where gentlemen were wont to gather in the evening to indulge in what rapidly became a favorite pastime.
The most noted of these places was situated at 14 Kearney street, which was opened in 1873 by Charles N. Felton who represented the Fifth Congressional District in the last two Congresses, and who is aspiring to gubernatorial honors at the hands of the republicans at the next election, with a good chance of having his ambition gratified. It was here that the late ex-United States Senator William Sharon, the builder of the Palace hotel, and who more recently figured the Sharon-Hill divorce suit, held forth nightly, and participated in some of the biggest poker games played. William Lent, the millionaire, who of late years has resided with his family in New York, but who is now in San Francisco with the intention of again taking up his residence by the Golden Gate; the late Johnny Skae, the many times millionaire mining operator, and John Head, with an occasional outsider, formed the party which sat in the stiffest game. Sharon had the reputation of playing the hardest game of poker on the coast, although Felton and others were generally able to hold their own against him. A $3,000 “pot” was not an unusual feature in those games, while $5,000 has been frequently lost and won on a single hand.
Of course, there were other “stiff” games, where high play was the rule, but Felton’s was conceded to be far in the lead. Everybody played poker, though the gambling was not so open as had been faro, monte and roulette in early days. If men did not visit the poker rooms, they played at their clubs or at private parties at their homes. The late William Ralston was fond of cutting into a game. Jim Keene, who has since lost his millions in Wall street, could hold a bob-tailed flush as long and with as much of owlish gravity as anybody; the late Heward Coitt, James Phelan, Senator Hearst and almost every other man of wealth and prominence has played the game to a greater or less extent. Politicians, lawyers, merchants, bankers, salesmen, clerks, all played, but in different resorts. The poker rooms, like faro and roulette had their day, but not long after the police turned their attention to them, the larger places, such as Felton’s, Harris’ and others closed up.
Notwithstanding that the game is played for high stakes at the Pacific, Union, Cosmos and Bohemian Clubs, there is only one poker room of any prominence in the city, which is conducted by Mose Gunst. The game is nothing like the one formerly kept by Felton, for instead of the proprietor being satisfied with his winnings and the sale of liquors, the game deducts fifty cents out of every one dollar fifty pot. The owner keeps a number of “pluggers” about the place to join in the games and keep them going. They are paid a salary and turn their winnings over to the house. While the direct charge of cheating cannot be made against the establishment, the cards are played very close and the visitor finds it an exceedingly hard game to beat, and gentlemen do not honor the place with their presence unless in a mellow state, and then rather because they are “making the rounds” than for the purpose of playing. A wealthy well known railroad president not long ago “dropped” several thousand dollars there one night recently, and since then has given the place a wide berth. All the cigar stands along Market Street have back rooms for poker parties, but each place has its regular patrons and strangers rarely visit them. The games are small, a twenty-five dollar pot being considered a bonanza.
From the earliest days shaking dice has been a popular mode of gambling. Nearly all the large saloons had, and still have, small rooms partitioned off where parties of four or five would gather around a small table and roll the ivory tubes for large stakes. There was no regular dice game established until E. J. (Lucky) Baldwin, of turf fame, assumed the personal management of his large hotel on Market Street, when he set aside one of the rooms for dice and another for poker. The place was very popular with the wealthy young men about town for awhile, but after being raided by the police a few times, the games broke up, although private parties risk their money on the turn of the dice almost nightly. There was another game in operation in connection with the Occidental Hotel bar for a time, which was very popular with theatrical people. W. J. Scanlan, the Irish actor, ran up against the game one night and by means of a smooth box was cleaned out of $2,000. The affair leaked out, but it did not deter Henry (Adonis) Dixey from trying to beat the game, with the result that he left money and paper to the amount of about $1,800 with the sharpers. This had the effect of breaking up the game, which was conducted by Charlie Hall, manager of the Bust Street Theatre, Harry Bradley, Jim Nellus and a bar-keeper named Welch, and since then the most that has been done in the way of dice playing at the Occidental, has been in shaking for the drinks and cigars. This last is universal in San Francisco. A man will step up to a cigar stand and “shake” the proprietor for a cigar, and then go into a saloon and repeat the performance with the barkeeper. If he wins he gets his drinks for nothing; if he loses he pays the price of two. Parties of gentlemen will shake dice for the drinks, the one getting the lowest throw paying for the party. The Italian fruit peddlers who go around among the stores and offices are always supplied with a dice box and the clerks, and even the solid business men, call the cubes into requisition to settle the price of a bunch of grapes or a dozen of bananas. If the business is dull the throwing may continue for some time, nickels instead of fruit being substituted for the stakes. The Italians are natural gamblers and will stake their last cent on any supposable contingency. Bootblacks shake dice with their patrons to determine whether the latter shall pay for two “shines,” or have his boots varnished free of charge.
In 1882, stud poker became the rage and flourished until it was prohibited by the legislature, two years later. The act, as passed, fixed heavy penalties, in the form of fine and imprisonment, to the playing of this and several other “short” games, which were specifically enumerated. Every underground saloon, and many of the better class of drinking places, such as the Baldwin Hotel, had a stud poker game in operation. The dealer is in the employ of the house and does not take any cards himself or make any bets, but deducts a percentage or “rake-off” from each “pot,” so the house is certain of winning every time. It is only one form of petit larceny. The dealers of these games were generally men of the lowest moral principles, and there were always from one to three “pluggers” in the game, so that by a little manipulation of the cards outsiders were easily despoiled of their money without being compelled to resort to robbery in the form of percentages. The large games were conducted on a more honest principle. Still occasional players found it next to impossible to win. The “brace” games had for their patrons (or victims) principally boys and young mechanics, with occasionally a countryman. It was a blessed thing for the morality of San Francisco when stud poker was abolished. There has not been a game in the city for more than thirty-six months.
For a number of years the sale of lottery tickets has been steadily increasing in California, until at the present time it is estimated that fully $300,000 is squandered in this way every month, fully two-thirds of which is expended by San Francisco alone. When the tickets were first sold in that city, the purchasers were chiefly, if not entirely, women of the demi-monde and their male companions. Then the sporting element got into the habit of buying tickets, and their example was soon followed by clerks; book-keepers and others belonging to the middle classes. Finally their employers began to invest, although at first keeping the fact a profound secret. They gradually became bolder and ultimately their wives, sisters and daughters concluded to try their luck, until now all grades of society, and both sexes are regular contributors to the income of the concern managed by Generals Beauregard and Early, buying their tickets openly and making not the slightest attempt at concealment. With the growth of the habit, the number of agents has increased until now fully one hundred people, male and female, earn a comfortable subsistence by selling lottery tickets. It is not an uncommon thing for a lady to be solicited to buy a ticket on the street by well dressed women. There is a law prohibiting dealing in lottery tickets, and prescribing a penalty for their purchase as well as for their sale; but as the police are all regular purchasers, they are very lax in following out the provisions of the law. There is a local lottery known by the euphonious title of the “Original Louisiana Lottery,” which has done a profitable business. Whole tickets are sold at fifty cents, but the principal transactions are in “halves.” This concern has no drawings of its own, but pays its patrons on the basis of those of the company. The “Mexican National Lottery” also sells many tickets in San Francisco, but the “Louisiana” surpasses all others in popular favor, and the Golden City ranks among the largest patrons of the serpent-like corporation, which has for so many years held the Pelican State in an anaconda-like grasp.
As has been said, a due meed of praise should be accorded the police for the efficiency of their action in suppressing public gaming. That a Chief of Police who has been, in times past, himself a member of the fraternity should introduce and enforce such stringent measures for the repression of a vice in which he had formerly been interested, and should follow up his former associates with such persistent intention to compel them to respect the law, is a matter for no little surprise. At the same time, a due regard for truth compels the statement that there is one form of gambling, fully as harmful as any other, which has supplanted faro and poker and which flourishes with but little fear of molestation. There are at present in full operation in San Francisco five large pool-rooms, and any number of smaller ones. The five leading establishments are those of Whitehead & Co., Killip & Co., Kingsley & Co., Swartz & Co., and Connors & Morris. These pool-rooms are protected and licensed by an act of the last legislature, and it is a mild statement to say that a faro game in every block in the city would not have a more debasing effect on the morals of San Francisco than have these pool-rooms. When it is remembered that each of the principal rooms pays into the Western Union Telegraph Company, $10,000 per month for tolls, some idea of the extent of the business done by them may be formed. A conservative estimate of the amount expended in the pool-rooms reaches the startling figures of $250,000 a month. An old-time faro dealer is authority for the statement, that “these new styled bunko games” (meaning the pool-rooms) “have not left money enough in town to buy a drink with.” The pool-rooms all have private wires connected with the leading race tracks in the East, and their habitues know the result of a race at West Side, Latonia, Jerome Park, Coney Island or any other tracks as soon as the people who sit in the grandstands and witness the running. Betting on horse-racing has always been a favorite amusement in San Francisco, but it is only within the last five years that Eastern races have been played, and now the legitimate turfmen will not patronize the pool-rooms. Who, then, are the patrons? Bankers, brokers, lawyers, clerks, salesmen, printers, young men about town and the outcasts of society, besides a number of merchants who cannot control their passion for gaming. On six days in the week, at the noon hour, when the most of these individuals are supposed to be at luncheon, the pool-rooms are crowded to overflowing, and a steady stream of gold and silver pours into the coffers of these moral pest-houses. The mode of betting is the same as in the East, “straight pools” and “book-making.” A victim of the opium habit is not more deeply the slave of his chosen vice than is the infatuated frequenter of the pool-rooms. Many a bank has been brought to insolvency; many a broker has found his cash box empty; and many a merchant has discovered his trusted clerk or book-keeper a thief, made so by these places. Every cent that can be gotten hold of is poured into the pool-rooms in bets on horses that the bettors have never seen. Let a stranger enter one of these resorts and he is instantly set upon by the boys of 16 to 20 years of age, who offer to give him “sure tips” on the winners for a small percentage of the winnings. A large proportion[proportion] of these “touts” have never seen a race in their lives and could not distinguish a colt from a filly; all their “knowledge” of the turf has been learned in the pool-rooms. These places are situated in the heart of the city where they are most easy of access to those who patronize them. At present there is no means of closing them and there is no telling how much longer the evil will continue, inasmuch as an influential local politician is heavily interested in one of the principal rooms, and as he controls his party in the state and that party has a safe working majority in the legislature, which does not meet again until January, 1891, there is no immediate prospect of relief. With such a state of affairs, it can readily be seen that there is not a great deal of money left for other games, such as poker and faro.