A Brief History of Blackjack

The game of Blackjack has history that dates back as early as the 1600's. The first mention of the game of blackjack in any written material was dated between the years of 1601 & 1602 in a book written by Miguel De Cervantes in which the main character played a game resembling blackjack. This author also wrote the book Don Quixote, who was also a blackjack player!

Blackjack was first played in the United States back in the 1800's and was not a very popular game at first. Because there was no real interest in the game when first introduced in the US, "gambling houses" [which are now casinos] tried offering bonuses to players to gain some interest. The more popular of bonuses was a 10 -1 payout for a hand consisting of the Ace of Spades and a Black Jack, calling it a hand of Blackjack. Once the game caught on in the US, gambling houses abolished these bonuses.

In 1956 a man named Roger Baldwin wrote an essay on blackjack called "The Optimum Strategy in Blackjack". It was published in the "Journal of the American Statistical Association"; it consisted of 10 pages detailing a "mathematical" theory to the game of Blackjack use stats and probability showing ways to beat the casino advantage. The calculators used today for card counting and statistical odds were originated from this theory.

The next piece of information that was published on the game of blackjack was in the year of 1962, by Professor Edward O. Thorp, who came up with the first known technique of card counting. He wrote a book in 1963 called "Beat the Dealer" which became a huge best seller Nationwide.

In response to the huge success of this book and players interest in card counting, casinos all over modified the game of Blackjack to make it more difficult for a player to win! They also added the multiple decks Blackjack game in this era to minimise the chance of players beating the casino.

But the most successful piece of literature to date on Blackjack was written by Stanford Wong, a Professional Blackjack player who did research and published a piece about "computer simulation to teach Blackjack strategy, the "bible of blackjack".

Jim Haines writes blackjack tips and is a regular casino gambler both at US friendly casinos and at their land based equivalents.