Author: horse-racing-free-tips

Poker has a mysterious past and cannot be definitely traced to a certain point in the history of card playing. It resembles a Persian game, which went by the name of NAS and may have been brought to the states via sailing ships the anchored in New Orleans. French Canadians who came down to New Orleans and helped to settle the city may have also brought poker to New Orleans. From the city of New Orleans, the game traveled up river on the Mississippi as the gambling game of choice on paddle wheelers. The steamboat game that was played at the time was 5-card stud. This game grew in popularity and was taken to heart by the soldiers and frontiersmen that came into contact with it in the saloons that were located on the river. From there it moved west and east, as travelers liked the game as a game to gamble on among friends. The game really moved west during the outbreak of the gold rush and then grew in popularity during the Civil War. Between the soldiers playing the game and the fact that every saloon offered the game to its patrons, the country became hooked on poker.

After the Civil War, the game changed to 5-card draw as you could get more bets in on a single hand and it brought the art of bluffing to a new height since a player was not showing any of their cards. 7-card stud then replaced this game and then the game of Texas Holdem came into being and is now the most popular game of poker of all time.

Poker is played by all classes of people and is one of the most popular games played in Washington DC by the politicians and even the President in the time of Truman. With this acceptance by both high society and the common man, the game as we now see it on TV has a following that is hard to ignore

The birth of the Internet and the addition to this service of poker has led to the astronomical numbers of people playing online on any given day. This one thing opened the floodgates of players from all over the world. Now days you can play in the local poker room or online at a time of your choosing. Your choice of game can be varied online as most online poker rooms offer a selection of games as well as limits for those games. You can also choose between a ring game or playing in a tournament. The prize money offered and the entry fees differentiate the tournament choices. There is a tournament for any player.

The game has come along way from the early days on the Mississippi and no one could have predicted how this game would permeate the various classes of people the way it has in the last 25 years.

Poker is a card game with many theories about its history and many debates about its origins. Poker may have been around for more than ten centuries in the form of other card games. It is believed that the word ‘poker’ was derived from an underworld slang word ‘poke’ – this was a term used for pickpockets. When card-sharks cheated somebody out of their money they boasted about having ‘poked’ that person. An ‘r’ was added to the term ‘poke’ so that the sharks could refer to what they were doing in front of their victims, who would be none the wiser!

While there seems to be no clear ancestor to the game, for the United States at least, Poker has a definite history. Poker began in New Orleans when the French settlers introduced poque in the 18th century. This was a card game which involved betting and bluffing and there are many game historians who believe that this is where poker originates. There have been many modifications to the game, including ‘stud poker’, the ‘draw’ and the ‘straight’ which became popular during the Civil War. Slowly ‘poker’, as the game became known, spread to other states via steamboats, wagons and trains.

Poker initially began with a deck of 20 cards, and eventually evolved into a deck of 32 cards. During the 1830s a 52 card deck became the norm. In 1875 the joker was introduced as a wild card. At the end of the Civil War poker reached the towns of the Old West. It wasn’t long before they realized that easy money could be made from playing (or perhaps cheating at) poker. Legends were created involving the potent mixture of saloons, poker and guns. Brave gamblers in the old west towns of Dodge City and Deadwood could be found taking their chances with their backs to the walls and their guns at the ready.

By the end of the 19th century, gambling and poker had spread throughout both the United States and the world. American states and cities began to see an opportunity for raising money. They taxed the gambling dens to raise money for their communities.

Nowadays casinos have taken over from the saloons and the game is strictly regulated by gambling laws. It is played more than any other card game in the world and has even become a sporting event, offering very rich pickings for the serious player. Finally, there is no doubt that poker has a rich and interesting history.