Why is Texas hold 'em so popular? - James McManus
Throughout the 1800s,
in saloons across the West,
you could find cowboys
locked in tense standoffs.
But these weren’t shootouts.
They were simply playing cards—
for a mountain of chips
worth their weight in gold.
Most men wore loaded pistols
in case a player was caught cheating.
When they prepared to make
their bets, however,
these cowboys weren’t focused
on their holsters or their cards,
but rather on their opponent’s face.
Because not even a bullet could protect
them from a well-executed bluff.
From its earliest incarnations,
poker has always been a battle of nerves.
The game first emerged around 1800
in the melting pot of New Orleans.
At this time, two games
ruled the card tables:
French poque played with a 20-card deck,
and English Brag which used 52-cards.
Both these games saw players being dealt
five cards from a four-suit deck,
and then trying to make the best hand
possible according to a simple hierarchy.
They would then wager on whether
or not they had the best hand—
either adding more money to the pot
or folding and forfeiting
their chance to win it.
But since each player's cards were only
revealed at the end of the hand,
someone with bad cards could always bluff—
betting enough to scare
his opponents into folding.
Both games had slightly different hand
combinations, but most importantly,
Brag allowed players to discard
and draw new cards,
making better hands more likely and
allowing for another round of betting.
Eventually, the Southerners merged the two games into a new version of poque— which they pronounced pokuh— that created bigger pots and opportunities for more complex bluffing. This winning combination of guile, guts, and gambling caught on quickly. But its popularity skyrocketed after the invention of the steamboat, which carried livestock, goods, and card games up the Mississippi, Ohio, and Missouri rivers. By Abraham Lincoln’s election in 1860, Americans in every state and territory were playing the newfangled bluffing game. And while many played for low, friendly stakes, some gamblers put their homes and livelihoods on the line. These life-changing bets even found their way into popular novels like “Gone with the Wind,” where Scarlett O’Hara’s father wins an entire plantation in a single hand of poker. But as pots became bigger, so did the temptation to cheat. Some players enlisted an accomplice to spy on opponents and used props to communicate their hands. Others marked important cards with nicks, dents, or invisible ink. But perhaps the most common method was sneaking a cold deck into the game. Cold decks were pre-sequenced to give victims powerful hands that encouraged them to bet big, while giving the cheater an even better one.
However, even cheaters had to keep up with the game’s constant changes. As poker moved west with the Gold Rush, new variants emerged. Five-card Stud became the game of choice among notorious gunmen like Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp, and Wild Bill Hickok. With four rounds of betting, Five-card Stud produced even more lucrative pots, encouraging so much cheating that California outlawed the game in 1885.
Meanwhile, back in Texas, another variant emerged to solve the common problem of having too many players and not enough cards. This game, known as Texas Hold'em, became a favorite because its low ratio of private, hidden cards to shared, exposed cards allowed for plenty of deductions and tactical maneuvering. Even more exciting was no-limit Hold’em, which allowed players to go all in, betting everything they had at any point in the hand. In 1928, Hungarian polymath John von Neumann sought to explain the nuances of betting and bluffing in mathematical terms. His work became the foundation for a whole new branch of mathematics called game theory, which has grown to be vitally important not only in high-stakes poker, but in economics and military strategy. In the late 20th century, game theory became essential for navigating the geopolitical bluffing game of nuclear warfare.
Today, America’s card game is an international affair, attracting players from over a hundred countries to the annual World Series of Poker. Fortunes are made and lost every day on casino floors, poker websites, and in thousands of live and online tournaments. So while a single game's outcome will never be certain, poker is definitely here to stay.
Eventually, the Southerners merged the two games into a new version of poque— which they pronounced pokuh— that created bigger pots and opportunities for more complex bluffing. This winning combination of guile, guts, and gambling caught on quickly. But its popularity skyrocketed after the invention of the steamboat, which carried livestock, goods, and card games up the Mississippi, Ohio, and Missouri rivers. By Abraham Lincoln’s election in 1860, Americans in every state and territory were playing the newfangled bluffing game. And while many played for low, friendly stakes, some gamblers put their homes and livelihoods on the line. These life-changing bets even found their way into popular novels like “Gone with the Wind,” where Scarlett O’Hara’s father wins an entire plantation in a single hand of poker. But as pots became bigger, so did the temptation to cheat. Some players enlisted an accomplice to spy on opponents and used props to communicate their hands. Others marked important cards with nicks, dents, or invisible ink. But perhaps the most common method was sneaking a cold deck into the game. Cold decks were pre-sequenced to give victims powerful hands that encouraged them to bet big, while giving the cheater an even better one.
However, even cheaters had to keep up with the game’s constant changes. As poker moved west with the Gold Rush, new variants emerged. Five-card Stud became the game of choice among notorious gunmen like Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp, and Wild Bill Hickok. With four rounds of betting, Five-card Stud produced even more lucrative pots, encouraging so much cheating that California outlawed the game in 1885.
Meanwhile, back in Texas, another variant emerged to solve the common problem of having too many players and not enough cards. This game, known as Texas Hold'em, became a favorite because its low ratio of private, hidden cards to shared, exposed cards allowed for plenty of deductions and tactical maneuvering. Even more exciting was no-limit Hold’em, which allowed players to go all in, betting everything they had at any point in the hand. In 1928, Hungarian polymath John von Neumann sought to explain the nuances of betting and bluffing in mathematical terms. His work became the foundation for a whole new branch of mathematics called game theory, which has grown to be vitally important not only in high-stakes poker, but in economics and military strategy. In the late 20th century, game theory became essential for navigating the geopolitical bluffing game of nuclear warfare.
Today, America’s card game is an international affair, attracting players from over a hundred countries to the annual World Series of Poker. Fortunes are made and lost every day on casino floors, poker websites, and in thousands of live and online tournaments. So while a single game's outcome will never be certain, poker is definitely here to stay.
