1936 A single penny got Los Angeles store owner Ethel Jamison convicted. One day at her shop, Police Officer James Mulligan placed a penny in the slot machine, pulled the lever, received a penny premium and cashed it with her. He arrested her, as slot machines were illegal in California, and the case went to…
Joseph “Doc” Stacher (born Gdale Oistaczer, 1902-1977) was a “a genial, shrewd, witty gent” who could be “homicidally tough,” wrote “Voice of Broadway” columnist Jack O’Brian (Monroe News-Star, March 17, 1977). Closely aligned with fellow Jewish Mobsters, Meyer Lansky and Abner “Longie” Zwillman, this immigrant had “galvanic” power and extreme wealth. Here are some facts…
1935-1936 In about mid-December 1935, New York newspaper reporter Martin Mooney (1896-1967) faced serving his jail sentence during the upcoming holidays. His offense? Contempt of court for refusing to reveal to the local grand jurors the sources he’d used in an exposé on illegal gambling in New York City. “It won’t be so bad if…
1938 During a preliminary hearing on the felony charge of using a cheating device while playing cards at a Las Vegas gambling house, Walter Eccles of Los Angeles explained that he’d used a holdout worn on his arm for “protection against a crooked gambling game” (Nevada State Journal, April 24, 1938).
1969 For a week in May, the leader of a group of U.S.-based gamblers rented the Villa Casino, which overlooked Hyde Park in West London, along with two craps tables, the latter for $2,500 (about $17,000 today) and 10 percent of the profits. They offered a gambling trip to England for $960 ($6,500 today) for…
1947 When the luxurious 12-story Mapes hotel opened in Reno, Nevada on Saturday, December 27, 1947, it boasted two casinos. One was on the river side of the main level, the other in the southwest corner of the Sky Room, mainly for dining and dancing, on the top floor. Both spaces boasted a “modernistic design,…
1940 They couldn’t just agree to disagree. They were the sheriffs of two bordering counties in different states. Sheriff Guy Joyner of Shelby County, Tennessee insisted illegal gambling was taking place just past the state line in The Magnolia State whereas Sheriff Elton S. Baxter of DeSoto County, Mississippi asserted no such activity was occurring…
1940 After some angry husbands in Los Angeles, California complained their wives were gambling away the grocery money, two vice squad officers raided the Monday night birthday party of Ann Dicker, a 73-year-old great-grandmother, at which she and seven guests were playing poker. (The policemen had climbed up the drainpipe to stealthily reach her second-floor…