How Twenty-One Became Blackjack

According to Richard Epstein (Theory of Gambling andThat curious bonus payout that gave blackjack its
Statistical Logic, Academic Press, 1977), blackjackname, however, has long since disappeared. There
became popular during World War I, and was calledmay be some casino somewhere that pays a small
"black-jack" from the practice of paying a bonus to abonus if a player is dealt a natural 21 which includes a
player who held an ace of spades with a jack ofjack of spades or clubs, but that is no longer a normal
spades or clubs. John Scarne, (New Complete Guiderule of the game. Today, a blackjack is simply any initial
to Gambling, 1961, Simon & Schuster), puts the yeartwo cards that consist of an ace and any ten-valued
when this curious rule first appeared at 1912, whencard.
twenty-one tables appeared in horse-betting parlors inThat's when Ed Thorp dropped another bombshell.
Evanston, Illinois. According to Scarne, by 1919aUnder the auspices of their Vintage Paperback division,
Chicago gambling equipment distributor was selling feltRandom House published a revised and expanded
table layouts embla¬zoned with theedition of Beat the Dealer. And the most important
announcement: "Blackjack Pays Odds of 3 to 2." Iaddition was Harvey Dubner's Hi-Lo counting system,
believe Epstein's information is taken from Scarne, andwhich Thorp called the Complete Point Count, with a
Scarne states that he discovered the origins ofcomputer-optimized strategy devised by Julian Braun.
blackjackin America as a result of his privateTo the casinos' frustration, this was a system that
discussions with old-time gamblers, not from anycould more easily be applied to multiple-deck games.
published texts that can be looked up today.Thorp was keeping the casinos on the run.
I am skeptical of much of what Scarne has writtenStill, the casinos' fears were mostly unfounded. The
about blackjack, so I'll quote from Mickey MacDougall'sComplete Point Count was easier to use than the
MacDougall on Dice and Cards (Coward-McCann,ten-count, but it was not a lot easier. It required players
1944, NY), which was published prior to any ofto keep two separate counts. In addition to the running
Scarne's books: "Many professionals dress up thecount of the cards' point total, the player had to keep a
game by giving prizes for certain hands. A favoritecount of the exact number of cards remaining to be
stunt is to offer ten times the size of the wager toplayed. And in order to play his hand, he had to
anyone holding a natural twenty-one with a black jack.memorize a chart of 158 different strategy changes to
This adds interest to the game, but it also tempts abe made according to the count.
player to increase his stakes."Thorp also included a Simple Point Count in this new
In an honestly dealt single-deck game, this gimmickedition of his book, but at the time that strategy
bonus would give the player a substantial edge overseemed way too simple to most players to gain much
the house, assuming the player knew basic strategyof an edge, or to be taken seriously by players who
(an unlikely assumption). I would also assume that awanted to beat the game. Later, the power of Thorp's
gambling house that offered this bonus would be usingsimpler method of adjusting the running count, without
any number of illegitimate methods to assure thekeeping a separate count of the exact number of
house a healthy edge.cards played, would be shown.