The casino game of chemin de fer was brought to the U.S. in the 19th century but it wasn’t until the mid twentieth century that a technique was developed to defeat the house in twenty-one. This article is going to grab a quick look at the development of that system, Card Counting.
When wagering was legitimized in Nevada in 1934, twenty-one sky-rocketed into popularity and was commonly wagered on with 1 or two decks. Roger Baldwin published a paper in 1956 which described how to reduce the casino advantage built on probability and statistics which was quite bewildering for players who were not math experts.
In ‘62, Dr. Ed Thorp utilized an IBM 704 computer to better the mathematical strategy in Baldwin’s paper and also created the 1st tactics for counting cards. Dr. Ed Thorp authored a tome called "Beat the Dealer" which detailed card counting techniques and the tactics for lowering the house edge.
This spawned a huge increase in twenty-one competitors at the US betting houses who were attempting to implement Dr. Ed Thorp’s tactics, much to the consternation of the casinos. The technique was hard to comprehend and difficult to execute and therefore elevated the profits for the betting houses as more and more folks took to gambling on Blackjack.
However this large growth in earnings was not to continue as the gamblers became more highly developed and more aware and the system was further perfected. In the 80’s a bunch of students from Massachusetts Institute of Technology made card counting a part of the regular vernacular. Since then the casinos have developed numerous methods to thwart card counters including but not limited to, multiple decks, shoes, shuffle machines, and gossip has it, complex computer programs to observe body language and identify "cheaters". While not illegal being caught counting cards will get you blocked from the majority of casinos in sin city.