DICE, TINHORNS and RANCHO NOTORIOUS

DICE, TINHORNS and RANCHO NOTORIOUS

Dice gambling then and now

Keith Souter  aka Clay More

Marlene Dietrich was one of the Hollywood greats. She became an international star in 1930with her role of Lola-Lola, a cabaret singer in The Blue Angel. Her western debut was in 1939 in the light-hearted Destry Rides Again, playing opposite James Stewart. Then in 1942 she played Cherry Malotte in The Spoilers alongside Randolph Scott and John Wayne. A decade later she played Altar Keane, the femme fatale owner of Chuck-a-Luck, an outlaw ranch on the Mexican border in Rancho Notorious. This was one of the first westerns I remember seeing and I thought it was fantastic.

           
I was particularly enthralled by it, because of the dice reference, since I was fascinated by everything to do with dice. And of course, Chuck-a-Luck was one of the dice games played in the Old West.

Rancho Notorious was originally to have been called The Legend of Chuck-a-Luck, but Howard Hughes, the head RKO Pictures changed the name. It was probably a good decision, for the name may have given too much of the story away. Rancho Notorious has a great ring to it.

                                            Marlene Dietrich as Lola-Lola in The Blue Angel

Chuck-a-Luck

Chuck-a-Luck was played with a shaker cage, and was a popular gambling game on the frontier. It was sometimes called ‘birdcage’ for obvious reasons, and was also referred to as chucker luck, since it was notorious for helping the unwary to lose money. It was played with three simple dice and a simple arrangement of 6 numbers on a felt sheet.

            
In Rancho Notorious Altar Keane was a saloon singer who had bet her last $20 on a rigged chuck-a-luck game, but won a lot of money when gunslinger Frenchy Fairmont (played by Mel Ferrer) steps in on her behalf. She named the ranch she would establish in honour of the game.

Interestingly, Professor JB Rhine of Duke University reckoned that the birdcage was uncheatable; hence he chose to use it in his famous ESP experiments in the1930s.

Tinhorn gamblers

Before the shaker-cage or birdcage was introduced, Chuck-a-luck was played in the old saloons using a hazard horn. This was a tinhorn that was generally used to play Grand Hazard; another gambling that was played in slightly more up-market gambling houses. It was actually nothing like the English game of Hazard that would eventually evolve into the great American favorite of craps. It was in fact pretty similar to Chuck-a-luck in that it also used three dice and six numbers on a sheet or board with various odds added at various points to make it look both complex and enticing. Again, the house would pay out evens for one number, 2:1 for a double and 3:1 for a triple.

The tinhorn was a metal cone-shaped horn through which the dice were dropped. Inside it had projections, which ensured that the dice fell out at random. The first ones were made of leather, but these were replaced, especially by small gambling houses or by independents with metal tinhorns. In time the term came to be used for any individual who believed they had superior knowledge or aptitude than they actually possessed. Hence the phrase so often used in the west – tinhorn gambler.

Dice through the ages

Dice have been played for millennia. A tablet found in the Great Pyramid of Giza, dated to about 3,000 BC describes a game of dice played by the gods in order to add five days to the calendar.

             
Several sets of Senet, a board game played with dice were famously found in the tomb of the pharaoh Tutankhamun (c 1371-1352 BC). Intriguingly, some of these sets have a Senet board on one side and the Royal Game of Ur on the other. The Royal Game of Ur was played in ancient Persia, but may have originally come from India.

                                     The ancient Egyptian game of Senet, played with dice

          

The Royal Game of Ur was played in ancient Persia, but may have originally come from India.  

                                                           The Royal Game of Ur

Crooked dice
There have been dice swindlers around for centuries. The Museum of London has a pewter box that was dredged up from the mud of the River Thames that is dated to the sixteenth century. It contains 24 crooked dice, including a set of Fulhams, and a number of loaded dice. There were lots of ways that crooked dice could be made and used in order to fleece the unwary.

Of course, casinos now use high precision, transparent dice, which has removed any chance of them being tampered with. Yet still there are many adepts who reduce the odds against them by exerting skilful dice control. This includes setting the dice up in such a manner to reduce the odds of certain numbers showing up and to increase the chances of others. 

                                                         The Flying 3V set up

As I said earlier, I have been fascinated by dice ever since my early years and have made a study of dice games, dice tricks, dice divination, dice lore and all manner of dice games – from the ancient games of Senet and the Royal Game of Ur, to the medieval Gluckhaus and English Hazard, to Chuck-a-Luck and the great American game of craps. 

The Pocket Guide to Dice and Dice Games, p/b Skyhorse  2013

ISBN-10   1620871807

ISBN-13   9781620871805

$14.95

Kindle ASIN: B008O8HRHE

$12.58

The fruits of my study are collected in The Pocket Guide to Dice and Dice Games. It includes chapters on craps and dice odds, which may just be useful if you are venturing near the casinos of Las Vegas this summer.

JANUARY WINNERS!!!

Hi everyone,

I'm slipping this in because I forgot to do it yesterday. As you know, we are choosing a winner from our FOLLOWERS list each month to win a prize--just for being a follower!

The winner for January is.....

BONNIE (B.A.) KELLY!!!

Bonnie, you are the winner of a copy of WOLF CREEK: BOOK 1 BLOODY TRAIL!!!

Also, I drew the winner for a copy of FIRE EYES for commenting on my blog THE HELP YOU GET ALONG THE WAY.

My winner is..........

LINDA LAROQUE!!!

Winners, please e-mail me at fabkat_edit@yahoo.com for your choice of print or Kindle versions of your prize! Congratulations to both of you!

Cheryl

Six Sentence Saturday--Death Rides the Rails James J. Griffin

Howdy, and welcome to this week’s edition of Six Sentence Saturday. I’m Jim Griffin, and I’ll be your host for today. Later on, I’ll be placing names in my Stetson and drawing one name at random from all today’s commenters and visitors. That person will receive an autographed copy of my latest book from Solstice Publishing, Death Rides the Rails, A Texas Ranger Jim Blawcyzk story (or an ebook if the winner is from outside the United States, since the Postal Service has just jumped shipping rates tremendously). So make sure to leave a comment before you check on out. And speaking of Death Rides…

   “Conductor, I insist you tell me why this train is being delayed. Immediately!”
     In vain, a flustered Mike Hardy, chief conductor on the Texas and Pacific’s Shreveport-El Paso Limited, looked around the crowded Dallas station platform for help.
     “I’m sorry, Miz…”
     “It’s Mrs. Mrs. Isaac Hollister,” the middle-aged matron snapped. She waggled her finger under his nose. “I demand to know when we’ll be on our way.”
     “As I’ve already explained, Mrs. Hollister,” the harried conductor replied, “I really don’t know any more than you. I can only tell you we have orders to wait for the local from Austin, and it’s late. There’s a passenger on that train who must make his connection with this one. I checked with the station agent a few minutes ago, and he assured me the Austin train will be here within a half-hour. Once it arrives and the passenger transfers, we will be on our way, I assure you.”

All right, I’ll admit there’s a couple more than six sentences. Math never was my strong suit. Mea Culpa.

So, fairly innocuous start to the story, right? We have an fast passenger train being held for some V.I.P., probably an important businessman or prominent politician. After all, it must be some really high and might muckety-muck for the Texas and Pacific to delay their crack express.

The only thing is, the person the train is being held for is Texas Ranger Lieutenant Jim Blawcyzk, and his one man horse, Sam. Jim will be riding the train to what should be a routine assignment up in the Texas Panhandle. Unfortunately, a gang of outlaws have other plans. They wreck the train, kill the engineer, fireman, and messengers, and loot the express car safe of $20,000.00.

Jim barely survives the flaming wreckage, but after helping the survivors, the badly injured Ranger goes after the men responsible for so much death and destruction. However, what at first appears to be a simple train robbery turns out to be something much more sinister. The robbery is part of a much larger plot to destroy the Texas and Pacific Railroad. Jim finds himself in a race against time to ferret out the men behind the plans, before they cause even more mayhem.

Death Rides the Rails was originally released as a self-published book, Trouble Rides the Texas Pacific. Nik Morton at Solstice liked the original and picked it up to add to the Solstice catalogue. Thanks to Nik and fellow Western Fictioneer Charlie Whipple, who did a fantastic job of editing, this is a much improved version of the novel.

Since I’ve always been interested everything Western and particularly in the Texas Rangers, when I started writing (thanks to the encouragement of another Western Fictioneer, James Reasoner), it was only natural I would write Texas Ranger novels. Jim’s unusual last name is Polish, a tribute to my Polish ancestors on my mother’s side, and to the many Poles who settled in Texas in the 1850s. Like all my stories, there is plenty of action, and good guys who are unequivocal good guys. Most of my books are suitable for anyone from age ten and up. You can let your grandma read them and not be embarrassed.

If you like a good, traditional, action-packed Western, (and you want to learn how to pronounce “Blawcyzk”) I hope you’ll order a copy of Death Rides the Rails. It’s available in print and as an ebook from the publisher at www.solsticepublishing.com, through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other online retailers, and autographed copies are available through my website at www.jamesjgriffin.net, or drop me a note at PO Box 1714, Keene, NH 03431. If you get a chance, check out my site for information on my other books, and also to see me and my horse Yankee doing some of our therapy work and tricks.

Next time I’m blogging here at Western Fictioneers, February 7th, we’ll be talking horses. Want to know what a pie-biter is? Stop by and find out.

Adios for now. See ya down the trail, and thanks!

Jim

Photo credited to Susanne Hall

THE HELP YOU GET ALONG THE WAY--by Cheryl Pierson

Do you have a “collection” of special people in your life? People that helped you in ways maybe you hadn’t really given much thought to, but that turned out to be extremely important? One of the first milestones in my writing career—becoming a finalist in the EPIC Awards with my first novel, FIRE EYES—brought this realization home to me. I got curious. I know there are incidents in people’s lives that are pivotal to their entire careers, dreams, and goals, that, perhaps at the time, don’t seem that important. Later, looking back on it, it becomes an “aha” moment—you understand that THIS was the moment when you made the decision to do something you might not have done otherwise, or because of a word of encouragement you continued on when you’d been ready to stop.

Most people that I’ve met in the last half of my adulthood would never describe me as “shy,” but as a youngster, I was—horribly. That’s one reason I turned to writing. It was a great way for me to get my feelings out without actually having to say them. I could have someone else say it all for me.

I imagine that’s how many of my fellow writers started, too. I sometimes wonder what might have happened had we all known each other when we were younger. Would we have developed into the writers we are today, or would we have found our “niche” with one another and NOT turned so much to writing?

If you can relate to the “shy” part, then maybe you felt this way, too: I was never competitive. Not like so many sports contenders might be. The things I enjoyed, writing and music, were open to everyone, I felt. I am not a “joiner” and I am not one to enter a lot of contests. I entered FIRE EYES in the 2010 EPIC Awards competition, and something odd happened when I did.

From the moment I entered, my attitude about myself changed. BEFORE I entered, I thought, “I probably don’t have a chance.” But my mom always used to say, “If you don’t enter, you certainly are NOT going to win!” I remembered those words, and sent in my entry that very day. Once it was sent, I began to feel some confidence growing. As I analyzed WHY, here’s what I came up with.

FIRE EYES was a joint project. I wrote it, but I couldn’t have if I hadn’t had the cooperation and support of my family—my kids and my husband. While I was writing it, my oldest sister, Annette, was constantly asking about “how it’s coming” and she was the one I could bounce ideas off of. Once written, my business partner read it for glaring mistakes, and my best friend of 45 years read it for moral support. The Wild Rose Press accepted it, and my editor, Helen Andrew, was so phenomenal in helping me mold it and shape it into the story that was released last May. My cover artist, Nicola Martinez, did a superb job on the beautiful cover. My family and friends were all pulling for me, and constantly offering encouragement. With all these people behind me and my story, my confidence rose. Whatever would be, would be—and entering the competition was a win/win situation. Even if I didn’t make it to the finals, I would still have taken the chance and had the experience.

When I received the news that my book was, indeed, a finalist, I thought immediately of all the people who had helped me get to this point; people in my life who had faith in me, and in my ability, and in the story itself. I thought of that saying, “It takes a village to raise a child.” It’s true, even in the broader sense of our lives as writers. The experiences we had growing up, people who encouraged us even then, our spouses, our children, mentors and teachers we’ve had along the way, and peers that have helped and encouraged us. Editors, artists, publishers and organizations such as EPIC that give us a chance to compete and strive to be better and better, along with our readers, are all part of the completed circle of a successful writer’s endeavors.

Though FIRE EYES didn’t win that year, the experience of entering the competition and finaling in it was more important that I could have realized when I sent my entry in. It was the thing that made me understand just how many people had been involved in the entire process of writing that book. And it gave me the impetus and encouragement to move forward with the rest of my writing projects since that time. That realization was far more important than winning the contest, and has been with me every day, like a component of myself that I didn’t have before; another part of my make-up.

Since then, FIRE EYES has gone to a different publisher, WESTERN TRAIL BLAZER. With yet another great cover, this time by Karen Nutt, and a fantastic publisher, Rebecca Vickery, it’s once again seeing renewed success. But moreover, that’s yet another example of the help I’ve gotten on my writing journey.

Does anyone have a “special person” that helped them along the way? Not just in writing, but in your life’s goals and dreams? What about a “collection” of special people? My “collection” of special people in my life is the thing that I am most thankful for above all else. Without them, my dreams could have never happened. I could never have done it alone.

Cheryl's Amazon Author Page:
https://www.amazon.com/author/cherylpierson

SO YOU WANNA BE A COWGIRL? ~ Tanya Hanson

Uh, so why did I decide on western romance when I reckoned it was time to sit down and write? Well, cowboys are hotties, for one thing. Next up, the western T.V. shows of my childhood wouldn’t stay still in my imagination. Last, college days in Nebraska and student teaching in Colorado sorta iced the western cake.

But I’m a California beach girl raised in a suburb. Whatever to do to live the life of the West and feel the love? The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in the Wild West could only do so much. I did call up horseback riding in Girl Scout camp eons ago and Audra Barkley in The Big Valley. But I just needed some first-hand help


And I found it in a city slicker wagon train adventure where I trekked by horse and civilized Conestogas around the Tetons! Wow, do Jess Warburton and his family at Teton Wagon Train and Horse Adventure make it real. (http://www.tetonwagontrain.com/tetonhistory.htm)

First off, upon discovering this treasure, I had to convince hubby to ride along. I thought I’d be in for a lot of whining and cajoling, but he was on board right away. Second to hook were our favorite travel-buddies, his sis and her man.

On a hot August day, we left Jackson Hole for the trip of a lifetime. Four days in Paradise. Our group of city slickers included us four Californians as well as faux cowpokes from Pennsylvania, Texas, Florida, Illinois as well as Bermuda, Japan, and Brighton, England.

We set off both riding the wagon and going horseback. The tourist-friendly trail horses were friendly, accommodating and extremely patient. But unspeakably grand were the draft horses who pulled the wagons, the Percherons and Belgians. They were named in teams, such as Lady and Tramp, Gun and Smoke, Sandy and Sage, Jack and Jill. The first name is always the horse on the left. These glorious beasts are capable of pulling up to 4,000 as a team, and they love to work. (In winter, to stave off boredom, they lead sleigh rides to the elk refuge outside Jackson.)

Ah, there was nothing like Dutch oven meals prepared for us over an open fire. “Cowboy potatoes” are good enough for any city restaurant. Waking up to the scent of piles of bacon simmering was, well, enough to make my mouth water still!

After suppers, we huddled around the campfires to hear guitar strumming, legends and lore of the Old West, cowboy poetry, and home--on-the-range music. Our last night--not to reveal company secrets-involved gunfire and mountain men!

Our tents were rustic, but comfy. And the “facilities”, well, suffice it that often there was “girl meadow” to the left, “boy meadow” to the right.

Although I admit the wagons had rubber tires and padded seats, the rocky trail is laughingly and rightfully called “cowboy rollercoaster.” Our driver Marisa told us she’s paid extra to hit every pot hole and rock in the road for “authenticity.” I’m not sure she was joking!

Our last day, a “Pony Express” rider burst into camp bearing letters from home.

As for Wyoming, ah, the trees and wildflowers and the endless starshine at night will live inside my head until my last moment.

As for this wannabe-cowgirl, I even managed to rope the pretend cow, Corndog, after my lariat lesson in “spoke” and “honda”. It took me three tries, but I nailed it!


www.tanyahanson.com
www.petticoatsandpistols.com