Show I NEVADA NOW WHOLLY GOOD GOODAt At midnight the first day of October the tho state of Nevada became wholly good The last chink of the chips and the the- thelast last burr of the wheel sounded through the tho gambling halls front from Paradise Para Para- disc dise valley to Kimberley The law forbidding licensed gambling passed gassed last spring and it set et the date when it should become opera operative five tive as October 3 11 This was even be bc before fore Nevada knew that it was to be Ignored by the pilgrimage of the worlds world's sports to witness the encounter between the pride of the white race and the tho Galveston thunder cloud on July 4 Nevada did not realize how good it was going to bo when the lawmakers put the quietus on licensed gambling because it was not until the prize fight issue was raised by the refusal of the governor of California to allow the Johnson Johnson-Jeffries battle to be held in San Francisco than the promise was made to the moral clement in the tho legislature leg leg- that Just ne fight more and anda a law prohibiting prize fights could be passed as a brother to the tho bill prohibiting prohibit prohibit- ing gambling So gambling is dead and soon prize prizefights prizefights fights will be dead in Nevada Not a single sincle element of primitive naughtiness remains for the comfort of the citizens of the sag sagebrush brush state beyond the oc occasional shooting up ui of a Japanese camp One day in the latter part of last June when the first of the tho sports had begun to liven the streets of Reno Keno Jim May one of the biggest gamblers in and proprietor of Palace on Main on-Main Iain street in the trig little town by the was discussing with some pessimism the future of the state when gambling and prize fighting should be barred Why Why the mines are all watered so dep with bum they have fo to keep triple pumps going in every treasurers treasurer's treasurers treasurer's treas treas- office to keep the safe doors open said May Theres There's nothing more in stock raising since the beef bee trusts bought up all up-all tall the ranges i A fellow cant can't go mit with a sawed off shotgun and take something from the Pargo people any more without with with- out getting a call from the insurance companies about increasing his pre pre- for risks 1 dont don't see what were we're all coming to when they close down on the gambling and knock a the prize fights J I guess some of us will have hao to go to New York and sell pineapple lands in the middle of Death f valley t. t Famous Jim May Now Jim May would be just the man to do this if tie hc wanted to Tim Jim was j the tho biggest gambler in Nevada when shut down on And added t his stock of fearless almost child child- j I like courage he possessed the endowment endow endow- ment envied of all gamblers that of being shot with luck They tell a ai i story out in Nevada of the last time took a drink which was many manyI I years ago He had breezed into a big gambling h house in Carson City with a regular old fashioned sagebrush drunk the tho kind which lingers and lingers but which is exhilarating in its apogee He lie had leaned against the corner of a. a rou lette table so long that his stock of double eagles had entirely melted through the tho sides of his canvas coin coin sack Seeing that ho was cleaned May had begun in a dazed way to run his fingers fin fin- S. S gers through the pockets of his coat and waistcoat Away down in one corner cor- cor ner of a waistcoat pocket he lc found a crumpled bit of soft green paper a abill abill bill which in disdain for anything but hard money he had i in some time past r- r towed showed away there tale goes goes and there are many versions that May planked Urn Hie crumpled crumpled crum crum- pled bill town on the single number 28 of the roulette field without opening open open- 4 jug ing it out to see what the spot was 4 The marble dropped in 28 the banker spread out the crumpled bill and saw that that it was was stamped with the mark T May sobered up right there and went 1 away away from that table with in his is coin sack He lie has never dared take t a drink since then v l Perhaps this genial little man with s 1 shoulders as wide as the front of a hog X engine is the most typical figure among T all the latter day gamblers of Nevada V He ITo began life somewhere in the east cast but he promptly forgot where when he out to Arizona in the roaring days of r the latter latter lOs There lie lived in hard land a among hard men and ho adopted the profs profs- V of gambling just as one might elect to become an architect or a v gyman He rubbed shoulders with road i agents Indian fighters gun men and renegades and because of his breadth V Mg shoulder sholder and the nervous speed of liis trigger finger finger- he progressed and kept his skin fairly intact Prom Arizona May moved moved up into v the thc first days ays of the Tonopah Tone Tono- pah fever He Ic grow up with the country country coun- coun try establishing his gambling houses c v hero and there wherever men hid had i money t to risk and them all with the same system that a man would employ in running a chain There wa was just one prideful boast that May in ni it even his enemies cue ene- flues mies boro horo him out This was that he heran heran ran ran his his' percentages to make profits and he he took his chances with the tho best of gamblers at a keeping his c. c safes which could meet any run against the house In Awed Whispers Middle Middle aged aged men who have reformed cand and become elders ciders of the church out in inV V Nevada Novada today still speak in awed v whispers of the things that were done In in- in those C street palaces when men plucked fortunes out out- of the st stock k cx- cx change cha ge before 3 o'clock on sunny afternoons aft aft- and lost them before midnight v under the lamps of Orndorff Mc- Mc GoeS Gec 1 r Faro and chuck a luck were the games that were played at this this- latter lat lat- for ter palace Browns Brown's held strictly to faros fares Stories are arc told of how on some occasions cards would bo bt out in the keno game and there would be a new count every fifteen minutes The gold be stacked like coke on the thc bankers banker's table There was no limit to any of the the- games x S a man bet in a keno game gamo and won it The banker went over to McGee and told fold him that the houe had just lost Well Well said McGee you haven't the combination tp the safe have 3 you ou There used jo to be something abo those old gambling palaces that always struck a stranger as curious a for for- mer veteran of Virginia City recently i- i remarked as he was reviewing the past glory of the bonanza days When first entered the place you would see the tho bar of course course and and those bars were marvels of expensive furnishings in In those days Then beyond the bar would be a broad flight of steps T ily ily- carpeted There were never more than three or four steps and they led up to the broad expanse where the gaming tho-gaming gaming tables and the layouts were installed These Thice A steps and tho of tho elevated gambling floor produced somehow an impression of of magnificence especially because of the tho richness of tho furnish furnish- J 1 ings But funny thing was that this wonderful front as the gambler would j put jit it was purely accidental When gambling wa was at itt ita height a a. highly F- F moral legislature a law that no licensed gambling should be permitted on the tho main floor of any building So as soon as that law was passed every gambling place in Nevada Nevala devoted its main floor to the tho bar and installed its layout on this elevated platform thereby thereby there there- by complying with the tho law oven to the letter New New York sun Suu |