The great legend of the gambling world, a story that all gamblers know and half of them probably believe, happens to be about shipboard hustling. Authors aren’t the only people who go for the romantic and chivalrous gambler stuff. Gamblers do too. They like to think of themselves as characters out of Bret Harte, silent, suave, hard-cased pirates but perfect gentlemen and with hearts as soft as butter underneath.

The hero of this legend is a famous mechanic named Baldy Johnson, who really did go down on the Titanic I think. The story goes that he sailed for business reasons on her maiden voyage. Among the doomed thousands on board were a honeymoon couple, a sweet and lovely American girl and a handsome young Englishman, very wealthy and unsophisticated. Baldy’s mob laid for the husband, hooked him and all the way they played cards in the young couple’s cabin. Three nights out, the young bride spilled her handbag and out rolled a wedding ring. Baldy picked it up for her, looked at her left hand, saw another wedding ring on her fourth finger and said:

“I’d have though you were too young to have been married before.”

“That’s my mother’s wedding ring, “she said. “I always carry it.”

Well, from then on that evening and the next one too, the husband began to win. The mob began to figure that either Baldy was losing his grip or double-crossing them and, in either case, they were pretty sore. But just about the time they were working up their tempers to do something about it, the ship crashed the iceberg and the fear of death broke up the game. They all rushed for the door but the strain of the collision had jammed it shut. Then they all started looking for life preservers and naturally there were only two in the cabin, the usual quota for a double-berthed room. The mob started fighting over the life-preservers-but not Baldy. He whipped out a gun and said:

“Now boys-don’t grab. We’re going to settle this like gentlemen with the cards.”

He handed the deck to the girl and told her to shuffle. Then he told the young husband to cut it and give it to him. Then he began dealing:

“First two aces get the life-preservers,” he said.

The other two mobsters naturally figured he would deal himself one ace and give one of them the other. Which one got it was such a pressing question that they said nothing, just stared at the deal and held their breaths. Dealing with one hand, Baldy dished them out. Once round, twice round-and then an ace for the girl. The mobsters sort of choked and gripped the table-edge. Three times round-and then an ace for the young husband.

With Baldy holding the gun on them, the two mobsters, white and shaking, put the life-preservers on the young couple and pushed them out of the cabin-porthole. They were saved. The last they had seen of Baldy Johnson, he was sitting with the gun beside him on the card-table, playing death’s head solitaire.

Back in America, the young bride told her mother about Baldy and how he had saved her life. She also mentioned the wedding-ring incident. Mother wondered a little and then went upstairs and got an old photograph.

“Yes,” says the girl. “That’s the way Baldy Johnson would have looked twenty years ago.”

“Darling,” says her mother. “That was your father. You never knew him. I left him just after you were born because he wouldn’t give up gambling.”

On 2013-08-22 16:17, AMcD wrote:
More seriously those books are old Cag, and very little information provided inside would apply with nowadays games. I'm a big fan of Mickey MacDougall, I have his books, sometimes even autographed (not to me lol). But his stories are sometimes hardly credible.

On 2013-08-22 19:09, AMcD wrote:
By the way, there's one demo I've never figured out about Mickey MacDougall. His bridge deal, out of a brand new deck shuffled by expert Bridge players... Hard to believe.

On 2013-08-22 19:09, AMcD wrote:
By the way, there's one demo I've never figured out about Mickey MacDougall. His bridge deal, out of a brand new deck shuffled by expert Bridge players... Hard to believe.

On November 9, 1938, Michael MacDougall , at a demonstration at the Cavendish Club of New York proved that a clever card sharp can do just about as he pleases in a bridge game against top-notch experts.

Before 100 luminaries of the bridge world, MacDougall played a game with Howard Schenken and B. Jay Becker as adversaries. Two ordinary decks were thoroughly mixed and handed to the players. MacDougall shuffled the blue deck and Schenken the red. After the red deck had been well mixed it was cut by Becker, and dealt by MacDougall. Before dealing, MacDougall announced that he would bid six no-trumps. With 100 pairs of expert eyes fastened on his hands, he dealt and made six no-trumps.

Then Schenken dealt the blue pack. This had been in full view from the time it was given to MacDougall to riffle. Nevertheless, after the cards had been cut and dealt, MacDougall received all 13 spades.

MacDougall accomplished it all by expert manipulation of the cards during the shuffle and the deal.

On 2013-08-23 15:12, AMcD wrote:
Hey Cag, here's my autographed "Gamblers don't Gamble" page I was talking about:

I've been lucky.