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The glitter and excitement that tourists associate with casinos is only a facade. To the gaming industry's front-line employees, its dealers, the casino is a far less glamorous environment, a workplace full of emotional tension, physical and mental demands, humor and pathos. Author H. Lee Barnes, who spent many years as a dealer in some of Las Vegas's best-known casinos, shows us this world from the point of view of the table-games dealer. Told in the voices of dozens of dealers, male and female, young and old, Dummy Up and Deal takes us to the dealer's side of the table. We observe the "breaking in" that constitutes a dealer's training, where the hands learn the motions of the game while the mind undergoes the requisite hardening to endure long hours of concentration and the demands of often unreasonable and sometimes abusive players. We discover how dealers are hired and assigned to shifts and tables, how they interact with each other and with their supervisors, and how they deal with players—the winners and the losers, the "Sweethearts" and the "Dragon Lady," the tourists looking for a few thrills and the mobsters showing off their "juice." We observe cheaters on both sides of the table and witness the exploits of such high-rollers as Frank Sinatra and Colonel Parker, Elvis's manager. And we learn about the dealers' lives after-hours, how some juggle casino work with family responsibilities while others embrace the bohemian lifestyle of the Strip and sometimes lose themselves to drugs, drink, or sex. It's a life that invites cynicism and bitterness, that can erode the soul and deaden the spirit. But the dealer's life can also offer moments of humor, encounters with generous and kindly players, moments of pride or humanity or professional solidarity. Barnes writes with the candor of a keen observer of his profession, someone who has seen it all—many times—but has never lost his capacity to wonder, to sympathize, or to laugh. Dummy Up and Deal is a colorful insider's view of the casino industry, a fascinating glimpse behind the glitter into the real world of the casino worker.

A collection of essays in which a dozen historians and novelists present their impressions and concerns about "end of the century Nevada." Human expectations and illusions are seen as a backdrop for today's Nevada as a new human frontier. As an overview of Nevada society, this study deals with culture as well as economics, with tradition as well as rapid population growth. The essayists inquire whether the friction between acquisition and preservation, quick wealth and refined sensitivity, will build a more humane and enlightened society.

The widespread legalization of gambling across the U.S. has produced concerns for serious social, economic, and health problems. For the first time in this country, an entire generation of young people has reached adulthood within a context of approval and endorsement of gambling as a source of entertainment and recreation. Compared with their adult counterparts, these young people have evidenced a higher level of gambling related problems. In Futures at Stake, specialists in psychology, medicine, law, public health, economics, casino management, psychiatry, and criminal justice examine this problem from the perspective of their various disciplines, producing an intelligent, thought-provoking, and valuable survey of what is fast becoming a leading social-health problem across the nation. Foreword by Thomas N. Cummings.

The Pequots have found success at their southeastern Connecticut casino in spite of the odds. But in considering their story, Paul Pasquaretta shifts the focus from casinos to the political struggles that have marked the long history of indigenous-colonial relations. Viewing the survival of Native communities in the face of genocide and forced assimilation as a high-stakes game of chance, he examines gambling metaphors in historical and literary contexts to reveal strategies employed by several tribes as they participate in various "games" with white society--whether land re-acquisition, political positioning, or resistance to outside dominance.

Through a comparative analysis of texts spanning four centuries—colonial war narratives, nineteenth-century romance fiction, tribal memorials, Native American novels—Pasquaretta provides a framework for understanding Indian-white relations and the role of "chance" in the realm of colonialism. He explores two intertwining themes: the survival of indigenous peoples in the face of the European invasion of North America and the ongoing contest of Natives and newcomers that has transpired in the marketplace, on the battlefield, and in the courts. In so doing, he considers the impact of reservation gambling on the development of contemporary tribal communities and the role of traditional Indian gambling practices and stories in the survival of indigenous cultural traditions.

Gambling and Survival in Native North America is a wide-ranging book that shows how Native Americans have become active participants in their own survival despite the popular belief that Indian tribes, as "conquered peoples," have been rendered helpless for over a century. Working within a system devised to confine and even destroy them, they have found ways to remain in the game—and, against all odds, have learned to play it well.

The eight essays in Gambling, Space, and Time use a global and interdisciplinary approach to examine two significant areas of gambling studies that have not been widely explored--the ever-changing boundaries that divide and organize gambling spaces, and the cultures, perceptions, and emotions related to gambling. The contributors represent a variety of disciplines: history, geography, sociology, anthropology, political science, and law.

The essays consider such topics as the impact of technological advances on gambling activities, the role of the nation-state in the gambling industry, and the ways that cultural and moral values influence the availability of gambling and the behavior of gamblers. The case studies offer rich new insights into a gambling industry that is both a global phenomenon and a powerful engine of local change.

Cattelino presents a vivid ethnographic account of the history and consequences of Seminole gaming. Drawing on research conducted with tribal permission, she describes casino operations, chronicles the everyday life and history of the Seminole Tribe, and shares the insights of individual Seminoles. At the same time, she unravels the complex connections among cultural difference, economic power, and political rights. Through analyses of Seminole housing, museum and language programs, legal disputes, and everyday activities, she shows how Seminoles use gaming revenue to enact their sovereignty. They do so in part, she argues, through relations of interdependency with others. High Stakes compels rethinking of the conditions of indigeneity, the power of money, and the meaning of sovereignty.

Less than a year after Agua Caliente opened, gangsters held up its money-car in transit to a bank in San Diego, killing the courier and a guard and stealing the company money pouch. Paul J. Vanderwood weaves the story of this heist gone wrong, the search for the killers, and their sensational trial into the overall history of the often-chaotic development of Agua Caliente, Tijuana, and Southern California. Drawing on newspaper accounts, police files, court records, personal memoirs, oral histories, and “true detective” magazines, he presents a fascinating portrait of vice and society in the Jazz Age, and he makes a significant contribution to the history of the U.S.-Mexico border.

The history of Reno during the first half century is to a great degree the history of Reno’s gaming industry. Between 1931 and 1981, the economy, skyline, and lifestyle of “the Biggest Little City in the World” were strongly influenced by the city’s casinos and the people who created and operated them. In The Rise of the Biggest Little City, longtime Reno gaming executive Dwayne Kling records the fruits of his fourteen years of research into the history of Reno’s casinos, from the backroom (and often illegal) dives of the industry’s beginnings to the elegant casino-hotels of today. Arranged in encyclopedic form with historic photographs (many never before published), the book offers the stories of such famous establishments as Harolds Club, the Cal-Neva, the Sands, and Harrah’s, as well as defunct clubs like the Cedars, the Silver Spur, and the Bank Club. We also find the stories of the men and women who created Reno’s gaming industry—such as James McKay and Bill Graham, who came from the rough-and-tumble saloons of boom-town Tonopah and developed a chain of illegal gambling clubs and brothels into Reno’s first major casino, the Bank Club; the Smith family—Raymond I. “Pappy,” Harold Sr., Raymond A., and Harold Jr.—whose Harolds Club was a prime downtown attraction for over fifty years and brought Reno national fame as a destination for fun and gambling; Bill Bailey, an African-American whose Harlem Club—one of the first integrated casinos in Reno—attracted such show-business luminaries as Louis Armstrong and Pearl Bailey (his cousin) for late-night jam sessions; William Harrah, who parleyed a string of small bingo parlors into a major gaming empire; and Jack Douglass, a slot-route operator in the early days of legal gaming who became a major figure in Reno’s modern casino industry. There are more. Kling records the stories of hundreds of gaming establishments, most of them long forgotten, stretching geographically from the Mount Rose Highway to the north end of town, from Verdi to Sparks; and of dozens of men and women who shaped the industry, for better and for worse. We learn from that Reno was the true pioneer of the gambling industry. It was here that big-name entertainment was first offered in a casino setting; that elegant hotel rooms and fine dining were first offered as amenities of the casino experience; that a casino corporation first traded its stock on the New York Stock Exchange; that ethnic minorities first owned and operated casinos, and first integrated them. The Rise of the Biggest Little City will engage readers with its authoritative account of the rise of modern Reno and of the colorful history that lies beneath today’s neon and glitz.