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The card game of twenty-one was brought to the United States in the 1800’s but it was not until the mid 20th century that a technique was developed to beat the casino in twenty-one. This material is going to grab a quick look at the development of that system, Counting Cards.

When gambling was authorized in Nevada in 1934, black jack sky-rocketed into recognition and was most commonly gambled on with one or two decks. Roger Baldwin published a dissertation in ‘56 which detailed how to lower the casino advantage founded on odds and statistics which was really difficult to understand for players who weren’t mathematicians.

In ‘62, Dr. Thorp utilized an IBM 704 computer to enhance the mathematical strategy in Baldwin’s dissertation and also created the 1st card counting strategies. Dr. Thorp wrote a tome called "Beat the Dealer" which outlined card counting strategies and the strategies for reducing the house advantage.

This spawned a huge growth in black jack players at the US casinos who were attempting to implement Dr. Ed Thorp’s strategies, much to the amazement of the casinos. The system was challenging to comprehend and complicated to put into practice and thusly heightened the profits for the casinos as more and more folks took to wagering on chemin de fer.

However this huge increase in earnings wasn’t to last as the players became more refined and more insightful and the system was further perfected. In the 1980’s a bunch of students from Massachusetts Institute of Technology made card counting a part of the regular vernacular. Since then the casinos have brought in countless methods to thwart card counters including, more than one deck, shoes, constant shuffle machines, and gossip has it, sophisticated computer programs to analyze actions and identify "cheaters". While not prohibited being caught counting cards will get you blocked from all casinos in sin city.