Gambler's Book Shop / GBC Press

Gambler's Book Club / GBC Press, now located at 5473 S Eastern Ave, was originally located in the Huntridge area of Las Vegas (closer to downtown than the Strip) the company has, for over 40 years, operated a rare sort of business: A bookstore & small press dedicated to gambling. Along with original books on various forms of gambling, the company engaged in the reprinting of "classic" works related to gambling that had long passed out of copyright furthering Founder John & Edna Luckman's vision of Gambler's Book Club as a place of learning for gamblers:

In 1964, Gambler's Book Club was born. Luckman envisioned not just a bookstore, but a library of gambling and a forum for gamblers to gather and visit, argue, gossip, lie, and - most of all - learn from each other.

After 45 years the shop moved from South 11th to 1550 Tropicana which instantly expanded their retail space and improved their location with better parking and access just 2 miles from the Strip.

Among the works kept in print by the bookshop:

  • "Stud Poker Blue Book", originally published in 1934
  • "Racing Maxims of Pittsburgh Phil", based on the only interview of the famous horseplayer, George E. Smith
  • The 1928 "Handbook on Percentages", republished in 1976 by GBC with the "...firm belief...that the library of any gamblephile is incomplete without this classic work."
  • The 1906 "Stealing Machine" by Eugene Villiod, the French detective

Among other notable works published: the first book on the now popular poker variant Texas hold'em, Hold'em Poker by David Sklansky. Although the role of publishing in the company sharply declined with the passing of John Luckman in 1987, printing and other services are still offered to authors leading to a roster of book titles available exclusively through the store.

The company registered Gambler's Book Shop as an alternate name in 1988 to clarify that this is a brick and mortar which didn’t require a membership card and to underscore its retail business.

GBC also produced two quarterly magazines, Casino and Sports and Systems and Methods. Luckman hired Howard B. Schwartz in 1979 as editor of these publications. Howard Schwartz, who was born in Brooklyn and earned degrees from the University of Montana, Kansas State and the University of Northern Colorado, has an education and newspaper background, he became the owner of the store after the death of Edna Luckman (co-founder, and wife of John Luckman). The bookstore, now led by Schwartz, continues to be honored by designations and awards.

The store has been selling online for 11 years, and frequently updates its web site with new products. The store also has a Podcast, an rss feed, and a monthly email newsletter.

Famous quotes containing the words gambler, book, shop and/or press:

    I have a notion that gamblers are as happy as most people, being always excited; women, wine, fame, the table, even ambition, sate now & then, but every turn of the card & cast of the dice keeps the gambler alive—besides one can game ten times longer than one can do any thing else.
    George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)

    Middlemarch, the magnificent book which with all its imperfections is one of the few English novels for grown-up people.
    Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)

    So it is with books, for the most part: they work no redemption on us. The bookseller might certainly know that his customers are in no respect better for the purchase and consumption of his wares. The volume is dear at a dollar, and after to reading to weariness the lettered backs, we leave the shop with a sigh, and learn, as I did without surprise of a surly bank director, that in bank parlors they estimate all stocks of this kind as rubbish.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free no one ever will.
    Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)