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Following the lead of Deadwood, S.D., at least eight old Colorado mining camps have proposed that limited gambling be legalized.
Low-stakes poker and blackjack supposedly attract hordes of free-spending tourists. The game in the saloon was a staple of life in the Old West, and tourists presumably want to enjoy an authentic experience in Colorado's answer to Frontierland.
However, we're short on authenticity here. The major card game in old saloons was not poker or blackjack, but faro, which requires a special table layout and a dealing box, as well as a thorough knowledge of coppering bets, calling the turn, the cat-hop, splits and dozens of wagering combinations.
There is no requirement that the playing cards be of the proper style. Before the turn of the century, cards did not have A or 10 with the suit posted in two corners. A five of hearts merely displayed five hearts.
This simplifies one method of cheating. Suppose you had a pair of 5s, along with 3, 6 and 7. Use a wet thumb to rub out the center pip on a 5 (not difficult when the cards are old-fashioned pasteboard, rather than new-fangled plastic), and your rotten pair of fives is a straight that takes the pot.
Cheating led to shooting. But the authentic
atmosphere
probably won't extend to where every man in
the saloon sports a revolver. It would be every man,
because decent women did not venture into saloons. Have the
authentic
towns made arrangements for sewing circles
and literaries for tourist wives to visit while their
husbands are whooping it up down in the old tenderloin?
Herein lies another anachronism. Without soiled doves working from cribs and parlor houses, how could you have an authentic old-time night on the town as you look for action along Blair Street or Meyers Avenue?
It makes just as much sense to legalize limited prostitution at $5 a trick as it does to legalize limited gambling at $5 a hand. Note also that western prostitutes were often addicted to laudanum, an opium compound, so there's another limited legalization in the interest of authenticity.
Somehow, I don't think any of this will happen. If gambling is legalized in a few mountain towns, it will be familiar games with familiar modern cards, and with none of the accouterments that always accompanied gambling in the Old West. It will be about as authentic as indoor plumbing, electric lights and Tombstone pizzas.
If the bars and tourists are willing to give up those 20th-century amenities for privies, coal-oil lamps and pickled eggs, then let them indulge in all forms of 19th-century recreation. Otherwise, it's time for our old mining towns to start figuring out how to make a living in the 21st century.
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