50 TWENTY-THIRD ANNUAL, YEAR BOOK— PART II. 



not a "chance game" for you have no chance to get anything unless they 

 let you. Some of the dolls they carry are at least two years old. 



A set spindle sometimes called a "camel hack" is under the control 

 of the operator all the time and is a very cunning device used to fool 

 both young and old. When you lose a dollar or more they lay down 

 as much more, sometimes double; they tell you when you get the right 

 number you get your own money back and twice as much. When you 

 drop out they let a "capper" win the pot. There are many other games 

 as bad as this one but time forbids me going into them. The old fashioned 

 paddle wheel was a game of chance but was run on the level. Why 

 more papers do not expose the methods of these games that rob the 

 boys is past understanding. I repeat that the merchandise wheels can 

 be saved at this eleventh hour, but the legitimate wheel operators and 

 the concessioner will have to hurry and try to assist in the clean up of 

 the crooked concession. 



If it takes a game of chance to make a gambling device, well, there 

 are -many of them operated in such a manner that the player has no 

 earthly chance so I fail to see how the operator of such a device could 

 be fined for running a game of chance. While many fair officials are op- 

 posed personally to concessions, they should not lose sight of the fact 

 that many thousands of people come to their fair from year to year to 

 be entertained and it does not seem exactly right that they should be 

 denied that which they enjoy and ar,e only offered the chance of seeing 

 once a year. Two-thirds of the people who attend state and county fairs 

 are persons who live in the rural district. The fair should not eliminate 

 the legitimate concession. 



A gentleman was fined at Little Rock, Arkansas, charged with operat- 

 ing a gambling device. Was fined $25.00 and costs and his gambling 

 device was ordered destroyed by the judge. The guilty concessionaire 

 said that a person had one chance in two hundred in winning a main 

 prize. A grifter is a robber in disguise, there are no two ways about it. 

 Grift is not a habit, it is a curable disease; be your own doctor. 



There are many usually straight concessions that, can be gaffed. The 

 old time "Huckle-de-buck is merely skill on the part of the player to 

 put the balls into the kegs. At the same time all bucket games may be 

 gaffed joints. 



Fair merchandise wheels do not come under the panning as to grift. A 

 reasonable way to sum that up is, even though every player who Spends 

 a dime does not win from 50c to $1.00's worth each turn, one of them 

 does, if the paddles are all out, and as for the others about 95 per cent 

 of them would say that he had his dime's worth of excitement, and real 

 enjoyment in the competition. How about betting on the big baseball 

 games, racing, politics, etc.? 



The clean-up campaign regarding concessions is against the "no chance 

 games," and there are many of them at which the player has absolutely 

 no chance whatever. Merchandise concessions, at which the merchandise 

 is actually put out and without buy-backs, (which, in reality, makes them 

 percentage joints) are not grift joints, as each player has his dime's 

 worth of fun, and he with his home town friends (no "cappers") gain 

 the coveted prizes for which each gladly takes a chance. 



