The Origin of Twenty-One
Posted in Blackjack on 01/30/2010 06:21 am by Alex
The casino game of twenty-one was introduced to the U.S. in the 19th century but it was not until the mid 20th century that a system was developed to defeat the house in twenty-one. This material is going to take a swift look at the development of that strategy, Counting Cards.
When betting was legitimized in the state of Nevada in 1934, chemin de fer sky-rocketed into popularity and was commonly played with one or 2 decks. Roger Baldwin published a paper in 1956 which described how to lower the casino edge built on probability and performance history which was very bewildering for individuals who were not math experts.
In ‘62, Dr. Edward O. Thorp used an IBM 704 computer to better the mathematical strategy in Baldwin’s paper and also created the first card counting strategies. Dr. Ed Thorp authored a tome called "Beat the Dealer" which illustrated card counting strategies and the strategies for reducing the house advantage.
This spawned a huge increase in chemin de fer players at the US casinos who were trying to put into practice Dr. Ed Thorp’s tactics, much to the amazement of the casinos. The strategy was difficult to comprehend and complicated to implement and thusly increased the profits for the casinos as more and more folks took to wagering on twenty-one.
However this large increase in profits was not to last as the gamblers became more highly developed and more cultivated and the system was further perfected. In the 1980’s a bunch of students from MIT made card counting a part of the regular vocabulary. Since then the casinos have brought in countless methods to thwart players who count cards including (but not limited to), multiple decks, shoes, constant shuffle machines, and gossip has itnow complex computer programs to read body language and detect "cheaters". While not prohibited being discovered counting cards will get you blocked from the majority of betting houses in Las Vegas.