Wheels Make a Monte Carlo of Riverview
Odds Far Against Players at Park.
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Source: Chicago Sunday Tribune, 10 July 1921, pt. 1, pgs. 1, 3.
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Last year Police Lieutenant Maurice Bowler of Cragin station was suspended and fined twenty-nine days' pay because he allowed a paddle wheel to run at a church bazaar in his district.
Last night a score of paddle wheels whirled merrily at Riverview park. The operators spun them on an average of about once every ten seconds and raked in a fortune in dimes extracted from the pockets of laborers, clerks, and factory girls.
What cost Lieut. Bowler twenty-nine days' pay was called gambling. But what is gambling in a church fair, apparently is not gambling at Chicago's Monte Carlo. Follow the reporter in his peregrinations through Riverview park.
Girl Plays No. 9.
A stout girl in a pink dress of cheap summer material stood watching the wheel spin at the "Parisienne Bazaar." She opened her purse and took out some change.
"I got a hunch on No. 9," she said to a companion, and slipped a dime on the number.
She was one of three playing. There were twelve numbers. The girl in pink didn't win and neither did the others; the chances were 12 to 1 against them. The girl in pink slid another dime on No. 9. Three more times she did it, then she reached into her pocketbook and came forth with a dollar bill. The operator changed it quickly.
"No. 9," she said doggedly, and again the wheel whirled.
Plays No. 9 Fifteen Times.
The girl in pink played No. 9 fifteen times. She lost every time. While she was playing there were never more than five dimes at the turn of the wheel on the board. But all the dimes went to the operator of the wheel; no one won anything.
"I guess I'm outta luck tonight," said the girl in pink, and moved along.
The next wheel was a big one. On it were fifty numbers and usually a dozen played at one time. A young man with a baby on one arm and a tired looking young woman at his elbow was trying to win a basket of groceries.
"O, come on, you'll never win," the young woman was saying wearily. But the husband wouldn't listen. He slid a half dollar on the counter, the operator gave him five dimes, and he placed one on No. 23.
$60 in Ten Minutes.
"Wait," he said. "I wanna try my luck on this skidoo number. It won just a minute ago, when I was on 22, and I got a feeling in my bones it's coming back."
The young woman turned to watch the crowds with her tired eyes. She was uninterested as they moved away, although a basket of groceries had not been added to their burden.
At the next stand a basket of groceries again proved to be the proverbial pot of gold. Here the reporter stood watching for ten minutes. During that ten minutes the operator turned the wheel every ten seconds by the wrist watch. Each time the wheel turned ten dimes were on the board.
During the ten minutes of play not one player one [sic] anything. A dollar every ten seconds. Six dollars every minute. Sixty dollars during the ten minutes the reporter watched.
Father Pays as Child Plays.
Here a boy of 12 was one of the most avid of the players. One after the other he wheedled the dimes from a man with a mustache who stood tolerantly behind him as he played. "O just one more, papa," the boy would beg at every other turn of the wheel. The father protested mildly but shelled out the dimes.
The father's eye caught the reporter's and his eyes twinkled.
"It's foolish, isn't it?" he said affably. "Games about as square as a billiard ball. If they would let every number be played so they would have to give a prize each time. It wouldn't be so bad. But they let about ten or twelve numbers get covered, then they turn the wheel. O, well. I don't come here very often."
Lure of the Kewpies.
Kewpies, kewpies, all dressed up in gaudy pink and blue tissue paper and beribboned to make them look pretty, were the allurement at the next wheel. Here the spirit of the gaming board has caught, among others, by a couple of sailors. There little white shore caps indicated they were sea dogs from Great Lakes training station. On their
[pt 1, pg 3] arms were a pair of typical Riverview girls.
"Never mind," one of the hearties was saying to his light o' love. "I'll getcha a baby doll if I have to spend the months pay, kid."
Apparently, however, a bit of ennui had taken possession of the girl, for she was loosing interest in the play.
Sailors Stick to Wheel.
"Aw, c'mon," she said, tugging at his arm. "Let's go an' take a ride on something speedy."
"You wanted a kewpie and you're gonna have one," said the sailor.
He and his companion were still in the process of spending "a month's pay" when the reporter, after ten minutes of watching, moved to the next wheel.
Dishes-- small sets of dishes, big sets of dishes, all kinds of sets of dishes-- were the "come on" at the next booth. A dozen players were engaged here, as usual. There was an undersized man who apparently had imbibed freely of the juice that cheers. He played persistently on No. 15, and shouted his disappointment loudly at each turn of the wheel.
"Wha's a matta—wha's a matta," he shouted each time as the operator flipped his coin into the box.
Gets Six Cops to Fill.
He yelled like a Comanche when the wheel stopped at number 12. The crowd gathered around, laughed and "booed" at him, but he won a box containing six gaudily flowered cups and saucers and wobbled away with them in triumph.
"Come on, boys! Step right up here and win your girls a box of candy," shouted the leather throated operator at the next wheel. "Come on, girls. Bring 'em right up here and make 'em spend a dime. A dime; ten cents! The lucky number wins a big box of candy. One good one makes up for a lot of bad ones."
Fifteen young men and girls were playing here, and three operators were engaged in making change and raking in the dimes. The wheel was spun furiously, sometimes as many as ten times in a minute. Each time as the wheel came to a stop the operators would shout in a frenzied manner.
Nobody Wins; Too Bad!
"Number—num-m-m-m-mber 10 wins the box of candy! Well, well, nobody on it this time! Too bad! Try it again and see if you can't catch the lucky number."
"Hell!" burst from one of the disappointed players. "I coulda bought two boxes for what I shoved across this counter already."
"Why didn't ya?" asked the sweet young thing at his elbow demurely.
To the reporter's left stood a young woman apparently fascinated by the game. Her companion, apparently a youthful husband, was just passing her a dollar bill.
"That's the second one," he was saying decisively, "and that's ALL for this wheel."
What's cha kickin' about?" said the young woman lightly. "Ya don't come out here every day."
"Maybe not," he responded, "but it's an awful hole in my pocket when I do."
All Wrong at Church Bazaar.
Thus it goes merrily on through the night. Fortuna is indeed a deceitful, capricious, and inconsistent jade. At the church bazaar she displayed her wiles to beguile some loose change out of the parishoners' pockets toward the construction of a new church—and it was all wrong.
At out northwest side's Monte Carlo it is a gaudy, bedizened, and double dealing Fortuna who coaxes an annual toll of millions in dimes from the pockets of workingmen, factory girls, and children—and it is all right!
If the wheel of fortune game that set Lieut. Maurice Bowler back twenty-two days pay is gambling, then Riverview park is a veritable nest of gambling. It is, indeed, a Monte Carlo. Every other concession there is a wheel of fortune, and the odds are always far and away against all the players.
With fifty numbers on the wheel, and the operator always careful to keep the number of players down to a dozen, it appeared last night to be a wonderful business—for the operator.
Ten players playing; a turn of the wheel every ten seconds; a dollar every ten seconds; 6 dollars a minute; 60 dollars in ten minutes; $360 every hour!
And the summer nights are long.
[End of news article]
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Page compiled: 14 April 2002
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