The Beginnings of Blackjack
The casino game of Blackjack was brought to the United States of America in the 1800’s but it wasn’t until the middle of the 20th century that a technique was developed to beat the casino in chemin de fer. This material is going to take a quick look at the development of that technique, Card Counting.
When betting was legalized in Nevada in ‘34, twenty-one sky-rocketed into popularity and was usually bet on with 1 or two decks of cards. Roger Baldwin wrote a dissertation in ‘56 which detailed how to lower the casino edge founded on odds and performance history which was quite confusing for people who weren’t mathematicians.
In 1962, Dr. Ed Thorp used an IBM 704 computer to enhance the mathematical strategy in Baldwin’s paper and also developed the 1st card counting techniques. Dr. Ed Thorp wrote a tome called "Beat the Dealer" which summarized card counting techniques and the strategies for lowering the house edge.
This spawned a huge growth in twenty-one gamblers at the US betting houses who were trying to implement Dr. Thorp’s tactics, much to the awe of the casinos. The technique was challenging to comprehend and hard to implement and therefore increased the profits for the casinos as more and more folks took to gambling on twenty-one.
However this large increase in profits was not to last as the players became more highly developed and more accomplished and the system was further perfected. In the 80’s a group of students from Massachusetts Institute of Technology made card counting a part of the regular vernacular. Since then the casinos have brought in numerous measures to thwart players who count cards including (but not limited to), multiple decks, shoes, constant shuffle machines, and gossip has itnow sophisticated computer software to analyze body language and identify "cheaters". While not against the law being caught counting cards will get you barred from all betting houses in vegas.
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