Railfans would never do this, but has anyone played cards or seen anyone doing so on a train? The movies have “The Sting” My experience was in the fifties on Reading’s Crusader. It had a Philadelphia to New York commuter crowd and my Dad and I went to deal with Louis Marx (!!!) several times. My Dad would nail down the breakfast table mid-train and I would go straight to the observation. A group of poker (or was it pinochle) players always got on in Jenkintown and moved into the rear table, rousting me from my perch. I would love to make that trip again, with the Jersey City-NYC ferry ride always the highlight.
rixflix Where you been?
I have seen card playing in the Amtrak lounge cars on my trips in this century, but don’t recall chips or money. My guess is the games are other than poker and if money is involved, it is a keep score and settle later arrangement. I don’t know for sure, but Amtrak train crews may be instructed to discourage/prohibit gambling to avoid running afoul with anti-gambling laws. That’s not to say that there couldn’t be an occasional high-stakes, money-on-the-table poker game in a room in a sleeper. However, I think the players in times past were often businessmen (along with the occasional hustler), and those types now tend to fly, to Vegas if they are looking for a game.
I have seen many commuters having a daily game. Again, appearantly other than poker. Often the trainman, if a regular on the run, would handle the storage and retrieval of the cards and lap boards. Permanent tables on rail commuter cars are rare and I don’t think they exist at all on any Chicago equipment.
Back in the 1970’s a friend of mine was a regular in a bridge game on his morning commute on the C&NW to his job on North Michigan Ave. Telling me about the game he said that one of the regulars was a “bigwig” with the railroad. “What’s his name?”, I asked. “Jim Wolf” “Dude! He’s the President.” “Oh! Nice guy!”
…Hi Captain.
Apparently card sharks were once a great menace on long-distance trains. In Minnesota, the conductor has the power by law to arrest or remove from the train anyone suspected of ‘dirty dealing’ in cards, and I believe the RR’s had the right to ban certain card sharks from being given transportation.
Yeah, I think it was bridge they were playing. The Reading’s dining room fare on these runs was kind of bland and you had to write your choices on a card. I guess they didn’t want anyone to go nutso on a moving train about a botched order. The practice was fairly common then. Can anyone clue me? My favorite Philly-New York dish was Pennsy’s Navy Bean Soup.
Rixflix aka Captain Video
I saw a game of Euchre on the Ann Rutledge last year. On the return trip the car attendant asked them to return to their coach seats. People buying snacks needed the table. No problem.
Santa Fe provided bridge score pads, a special thingy, in its lounges.
And, as the “City of New Orleans” song says, “Penny a point, ain’t no one keepin’ score”.
I really think Amtrak needs a “slot car” on its trains. They’d have all the money they would ever need.
There are some Metra (CNW) trains where a member of the train crew keeps the card-playing boards in the electrical cabinets of the coaches, along with the cards. The crew member is “compensated” by the players for his services.
On the private coaches that are on the Kenosha-Chicago trains, there are actual tables and chairs for the players. They also have playing cards custom-made with the words, “Stolen from Car #xxxx” on the backs, supposedly to keep the dirty, nasty, train crews and/or maintenance people from stealing them (I only have one deck [:-^]).
we play poker waiting at train meets thats how i make my lunch money.
When I commuted between Naperville and Cicero on the Burlington (1959-1962) I played in a 4-hand pinochle game both morning and evening. After transferring to New York I then played bridge every evening during the 1962-1965 time period when I commuted between Hoboken and Madison on the Lackawanna. My most recent “on board” card playing was with 3 young ladies; an Airman’s wife going to Barksdale AFB, a UofT senior returning to Austin and a recent divorcee going back home to Polpar Bluff, MO. I was having a few drinks in the lower level lounge of the dome car on the Texas Eagle when the trio invited me to play gin. The game didn’t break up until about 3 am when the Eagle stopped at Poplar Bluff and the divorcee left the train.
Late night (sometimes all night) poker and even crap games were commonplace among business travelers up through the 1950’s. These usually got started among acquaintenances made over drinks in the lounge car and would be played in a double bedroom or in the mens room at the end of open section Pullmans. Just about any Pullman porter could be counted on to provide cards, chips or dice in return for a $10-20 tip.
Mark
On the C.S.S & S.B comuter to/from Michigan City IN. and other stops. groups of people take the four and the three seat posistion and play cards to and from Chicago. Some even sit on the floor at the center doors( which is harder now that there are more high level platforms)
The tradition of “proper” card games goes pretty far back, especially on commuter trains that had club cars. Out West, the once-upon-a-time “Del Monte” commuter train that connected San Francisco with Monterey, had a club car and card games were typical. High stakes poker wouldn’t have been sanctioned, of course, but penny-ante and bridge or pinochle were deemed harmless.
Southern Pacific - like the Santa Fe Railway - had bridge score pads printed as perks for long distance passengers, and sold SP-promotional playing cards through its News Agents and in certain larger stations at news stands (and on board its famed SF Bay ferries’ news stands, too). I have seen SP playing cards decks dating back to the 1920s; the most recent set I’ve seen so far dates to about 1950-55, not including commemorative sets done later. A fair number of the Espee’s post-1940 streamlined and streamstyled, converted heavyweight club cars had tables with inlaid linoleum tables that bore the four suit playing cards symbols, one in each corner of the table top angled toward the center of the tables.
Central Pacific Railroad - in its special instructions to passenger trainmen - banned poker-type card games from its post-1869 passenger trains running either west from Ogden UT or east from CA to Ogden. More specifically, it banned gambling and card sharks and the latter were to be ejected from the train if caught gambling with other passengers. I suspect the Union Pacific had similar rules on its Omaha-Ogden stretch.
I have heard that the Pennsy “Clockers” and the RDG “Crusader” card games were grand traditions for decades well into the 1970s.
I have an old sign from the Pennsy, dated April1909 warning passengers that card sharks may well be lurking on trains and to be cautious playing cards with strangers.
There was a reprint of this sign in the 1960s, but the one I have is an original.