Have any of you fellows ever heard that the nine of diamonds was considered a bad luck card? I read that in "Greater Magic" in a simply mental trick by Vernon. Perhaps you are familiar with the routine, using five cards? Anyway, I'm not familiar with this supposed aspect of the nine of diamonds and I wonder if others are? I dont think they are today so therefore I question the reliability of the routine. What are your thoughts?

I've heard of the "Hope Diamond Curse"....but don't know of the nine of diamonds....sorry!



Bengi

I have actually used that five card routine a few times and it works about 8 times out of ten. I think the trick is called 'psychological force'.

[ This Message was edited by: greatscott on 2001-12-16 02:00 ]

the 9 Diamonds is considered bad luck from the olden days. It was understood to be the "Curse of Scotland"

you can read more about it here:

http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/playing-cards/curse.html

yellowguy, thanks for the reply and the site. I'll be sure to look into that.

It seems to me that the real "bad luck" cards would be aces and eights. Now that is a hand, the dead man's hand, that people can still identify with because of poor Ol' Wild Bill.



quack

I don't know about the 9OD being bad luck, but I know my fav and good luck card is the AOD!

I recall the fifth card in the Dead Man's Hand is uncertain but 9D sounds like one I have heard passed around as the card.

For a project a number of years ago - a custom pool cue - I researched this very question. The four known cards are the black Aces and the black Eights. The fifth card is unknown, but was never suggested to be the Nine of Diamonds. The most persuasive accounts seem to indicate it was a Queen.



Ultimately I inlaid four Ivory "cards" with the faces of the Eights and Aces showing - sans corner pips to match cards of the period - and inlaid a fifth "card" with a period style back pattern to indicate the unknown kicker.



Regards,

Thomas Wayne

I used to do that trick quite a bit when I was working for an Internet startup technology company. Not only was the nine of hearts not considered unlucky, it was almost always picked by the techies. The four of hearts worked pretty consistantly with women, but male techies pretty much always chose the 9D. I started using that as the force card when I did the trick for them, and kept the 4 hearts when I did it for women.



An interesting sidenote is that when I first did the trick for my wife, she told me she felt compelled to pick the four of hearts.

In Poker A dead mans hand (Wild Bill’s) is a full house 8’s over Aces in general no real suit preference.

Another little hobby of mine (losing money)


Mike

The nine of diamonds is (or was) called the
"curse of Scotland" because every ninth king was supposedly a tyrant and diamonds symbolized Scotland.

This is very old and I doubt whether you would find many people today who would get the reference.

And, adding more mud to the waters, I have been given to understand that Hickok’s Dead Man’s Hand was the ace of clubs, the ace of diamonds, the eight of spades and the eight of hearts; the fifth card was believed to be the queen of clubs.

Or, then again, maybe not.

However, I use the aces and eights theme in a Wild Bill piece I do in my new lecture, Wild West Wonders (shameless plug!)

cheers,

Peter Marucci

showtimecol@aol.com

Mike,

It is entirely possible that you and the people you play cards with have used such a definition, but technically this is not correct. By all historical accounts, and by documented poker lore, the "Dead Man’s Hand" is any hand containing two Eights and Two Aces. And without any shadow of doubt, Wild Bill Hickok’s final poker hand contained the black Eights and the black Aces, with an indifferent card as the kicker. A full house has (and HAD) nothing to do with it.


Regards,

Thomas Wayne

A Dead Man's Hand today is considered, in gambling circles, to be a hand of five cards with any pair of aces and any pair of eights; the fifth card is irrelevant.

But wait a minute!

James Butler Hickock has been dead for just over 135 years and we're still arguing about what he was holding when he died!

Good thing he didn't die in the men's room!

cheers,

Peter Marucci

showtimecol@aol.com

Perhaps then, instead of referring to our
"Willie" as our "Johnson" it would be called our "Hickok".

I've always heard eights and aces myself as well. Maybe that unlucky card was the one the dead man got caught palming in his hand?

Perhaps a brief history lesson is in order; look at the right side... maybe some part of this story can become fodder for new patter.



August 1876, Deadwood, South Dakota; "Wild Bill" (James Butler) Hickok was shot in the back of the head while playing poker in Saloon No. 10. His hand held the Aces of Spades and Clubs and the Eights of Spades and Clubs. The value of the fifth card is disputed to this day, but has never been thought to complete a full house; as I recall from research I did years ago, the most persuasive arguments favored a Queen.



Hickok's killer, Jack McCall, claimed (falsely) that Hickok had killed his brother and was quickly released by a judge. Historians believe McCall was seeking fame/notoriety, and thought killing the well-known gunman would make him famous - a strategy that was only partially successful. Unfortunately for McCall, he did a little too much bragging and told the poor-dead-brother story a few too many times in a few too many places. People who knew him and knew the brother story to be false began to compare notes and a few months later, he was "re-tried" in another local, found guilty and hanged.



Incidentally, when I first researched this story there was no real Internet the way there is today; among other avenues of research, I contacted the historical society in what was once Deadwood and spoke with several historians who compiled a list of books and historical references about the incident. I then sought out as many of these documents as I could, through collectors and rare book dealers. I also bought genuine playing cards from that era (several dollars each for cards in poor condition) for the purpose of recreating the look of cards from that era.



For anyone familiar with the Bob Seger song 'Fire Lake', you now know the reference contained in the lyrics "...Who wants to play those eights and aces? Who wants to raise, who needs a stake? Who wants to take that long-shot gamble... and head out to Fire Lake?"



Regards,

Thomas Wayne

9 of Diamonds Cursed? Sounds like you could generate some great patter to use it in a T & R or CardWarp type routine

Dai Vernon explains the "5 Card Mental Force" in Revelations 7.

His reasoning directly contradicts Hugard's "Encyclopedia of Card Magic".

Also, you have to bet something or it won't work!

--Warlock