"Auto Poker" New Form of Gambling

1906

"Automobile poker," a new form of gambling in public, has struck this city and is spreading from the sea to the Yonkers line. Along the avenues approaching the Sheepshead Bay race track men and boys in groups are playing "automobile poker." On Fifth avenue, Broadway, Madison avenue, and all auto favored thoroughfares, automobile poker is indulged in, evidencing that the new "bug" has taken hold, for the time being, at least,

The game is played thus: Stationing themselves on an auto haunted thoroughfare, the "bookmaker" and the players lay bets on the highest possible hand to be found in the next devil wagon which may come honking along. The auto comes and passes in a cloud of dust. The number, say, is 11,651. One equals an ace, so the hand showed is three aces. Those who guessed nearest to the value of that hand win. If the auto number is 27,244, the hand is two pair, four high. In the same way the number may reveal three or four deuces, trays, or fours.

The bookmaker takes all bets on any old number, but pays off only to the holder of the highest hand.

But the game is destined to put the bookmakers out of business, for the chauffeurs and their friends are "next," and the game is being already plugged by them. Knowing the number of their own automobile, they send their friends along the line to get down a bet, and then comes the automobile, the number prominently displayed, the wiley chauffeur sitting with apparent unconcern at the tiller.