Card Counting - History

History

American mathematician Dr. Edward O. Thorp is considered the father of card counting. His 1962 book Beat the Dealer (ISBN 0-394-70310-3) outlined various betting and playing strategies for optimal blackjack play. Although mathematically sound, some of the techniques described no longer apply, as casinos took counter-measures (such as no longer dealing to the last card). Also, the counting system described (10-count) is harder to use and less profitable than the point-count systems that have been developed since. A history of how counting developed can be seen in David Layton's documentary film, The Hot Shoe.

Even before the publication of Beat the Dealer, however, a small number of professional card counters were beating blackjack games in Las Vegas and casinos elsewhere. One of these early card counters was Jess Marcum, who is described in documents and interviews with professional gamblers of the time as having developed the first full-fledged point-count system. Another documented pre-Thorp card counter was a professional gambler named Joe Bernstein, who is described in the 1961 book I Want To Quit Winners, by Reno casino owner Harold Smith, as an Ace counter feared throughout the casinos of Nevada. And in the 1957 book Playing Blackjack to Win, Roger Baldwin, Wilbert Cantey, Herbert Maisel, and James McDermott (known among card counters as "The Four Horsemen") published the first accurate blackjack basic strategy and a rudimentary card-counting system, devised solely with the aid of crude mechanical calculators—what used to be called “adding machines."

From the early days of card-counting, some players have been hugely successful, including Al Francesco, the inventor of blackjack team play and the man who taught Ken Uston how to count cards, and Tommy Hyland, manager of the longest-running blackjack team in history. Ken Uston, though perhaps the most famous card-counter through his 60 Minutes television appearance and his books, tended to overstate his winnings, as documented by players who worked with him, including Al Francesco and team member Darryl Purpose.

In the 1970s and 1980s, as computing power grew, more advanced (and more difficult) card-counting systems came into favor. Many card counters agree, however, that a simpler and less advantageous system that can be played flawlessly for hours earns an overall higher return than a more complex system prone to user error.