The History of Gin Rummy

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by: IC
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Gin rummy which is also called "Gin" for short, is said to have been created back in the early 1900's by Elwood Baker, this game evolved from what was called "Whiskey poker" in the 18th century, basically this is a two player game which was thought to be faster than the standard rummy (a similar card game) and in which the aces which are supposed to be the cards with highest value in other card games, in Gin they are actually the lowest value, they have the following order: A-2-3...10-J,Q,K

But the actual history of this game goes much deeper that that, the game rules have been known to go way beyond the 18th century, in fact the earliest known rule book was first published in the tenth century which at the time described a game called "Gin Poker" which was very similar to the Gin Rummy game known today.

Now going even deeper, the origin of Gin Poker as stated above may have been Whiskey poker which is a variant of Poker; and Poker as we know it was an adaptation of the ancient Persian game "As-n as". Now, coming back to mid 1800's we find that according to the American Hoyle Whiskey Poker's rule establish that five cards should be dealt to each player and an extra hand to the table which is called the widow. The person with the first hand decides that if he has a strong hand based upon the cards he has, he may choose to pass otherwise he should take the widow (table cards). As it is, every player has a chance to take cards from the "widow" but once he takes cards from the widow he should place his set of discarded cards facing upwards on the table. This last part is of high relevance to the origin of rummy games since all of them have this in common, the discarded hand is always facing upwards at the center of the table.

As for the origin of the name "Whiskey Poker" it has been said that the name was given during the late 1800's because this particular game was played to get drinks or refreshments. mostly liquor. Most of these card games were played in saloons where a lot of gambling took place so according to the drinks many games where given to variations of Rummy for instance we know of Whiskey Poker because of the drink "Whiskey", there was Gin Poker because of the alcoholic beverage "Gin" and we also know of Rum Poker, name given by "Rum" drinkers. So because certain drinks were the "prize" given to the winner, the name of the games were changing and adapting accordingly. Other interpretations even suggest that the Mexican game "Conquian" might have proceeded the family games of rummy, thus lending its roots and origin to rummy.

Today we have a variety of "Rummy" games which were directly derived from it such as: ten step, anarchy, "Bing" rummy, contract rummy, Florida rummy, shanghai rum, between many, many others.

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