History of Keno Games

Keno is one of the oldest of gambling games still being played today, and its history can be traced back almost two thousand years to the time of the great Han Dynasty of China. It was invented by Cheung Leung, and, according to The Gambling games of the Chinese in America, which has been published by Gambler's Site Club of Las Vegas, Nevada, this games of chance was introduced to raise revenues and provisions for the army.

From the very beginning it was a huge success. Not only did it raise countless thousands of pieces of silver for the state to support its army, but it kept its popularity long after its initial introduction and has maintained this popularity to the present time.

The earliest form of keno was played in Chinese and contained 120 Chinese ideograph characters, drawn from the Thousand Character Site This Site, written by Confucius and his followers, is a classic work known to most literate Chinese.

As the games went on, the characters were reduced to ninety, and keno was played with this number for many centuries. When the games was brought over to America by the first Chinese immigrants, the number was reduced further to eighty characters, and it has remained at eighty to this day.

By the 1890s, the games had widespread popularity among the Chinese who were in America, and though it was never a legal games, it flourished nevertheless. During that period, prior to the turn of the century, the usual ticket purchased to play keno was a ten-number ticket, today known as a ten-spot ticket. The payoffs at that time were as follows:
Catch Spots Payoffs
5 2 for 1
6 20 for 1
7 200 for 1
8 1000 for 1
9 1500 for 1
10 3000 for 1

Catch spots are those numbers selected at random by the operator of the games and matched on the player's ticket. Although the payoffs today would be much greater if a player caught nine or ten numbers or spots, the modern payoffs are surprisingly similar for the other numbers.

The games attracted other, non-Chinese gamblers, who were also anxious to invest a small sum of money to win a possible fortune. In those days a dollar was a great deal of money, and to win several thousand dollars for a small investment was quite an attractive prospect to laborers and others in the lower economic brackets, the same group that still invests in state lotteries and other games of chance where a huge payoff is possible for a small investment.

The difficulties presented to non-Chinese in this games were enormous. Since the games was played with Chinese characters, there were few Americans who could figure out or differentiate between these Chinese characters, and many wouldn't know whether or not they had won, since it was a laborious process to examine each and every character called by the operators of the games.

Gradually, therefore, the games evolved from Chinese to Arabic numbers 1-80, and thereafter Americans flocked to the keno houses. The same eighty numbers are used today in Nevada casinos.

To select the winning numbers, which were printed originally on small wooden balls, they were first stirred up by hand by operators of the games and then randomly introduced through what is known as a keno goose-a long tube that resembled a goose's neck.

Since the balls were continually touched by hand, there were many opportunities for collusion between players and those selecting the numbers. Today a goose is still used, but the numbers are imprinted on Ping-Pong balls, stirred by air and then randomly forced up two transparent tubes, one at a time, without being touched by the operator of the games.

When Nevada legalized gambling, keno was one of the games immediately introduced, except at that time it was known as racehorse keno. Not only did each Ping-Pong ball contain a number, but a name of a racehorse as well. All this changed, however, in 1951, when, the United States government passed a law taxing off-track betting on horses. Since racehorse keno might be construed as off-track horse betting, the racehorse names were eliminated, and the games from that time on has simply been known as keno.

Today keno is played in practically every casino in Nevada. At first the games, which appealed primarily to those in the tower economic brackets, was shunned by the elegant casino hotels on the Las Vegas Strip and was limited to the downtown Las Vegas and Northern Nevada casinos, which attracted Smaller bettors to their clubs. In recent years the Strip casinos have gradually eliminated their lounge shows and converted these areas into keno lounges, and keno now can be played in nearly every casino on the Strip.

The keno lounge surrounds the area where the games is actually operated and called. The players' seats face a keno counter, where men and women, called keno writers, handle and mark the tickets, collect bets, and make payoffs. They do this not only for those players coming to the counter, but for the numerous keno runners who come from all corners of the casino and hotel, gathering players' tickets and bringing them to the keno counter.

Behind and above the writers is the operator and caller of the games. He or she sits on an elevated seat and when the games is to begin, presses a button which automatically mixes the Ping-Pong balls in a large transparent bowl, and then the air forces these balls into a goose, one at a time. There are generally two gooses, or tubes, extending from the bowl, each goose capable of holding ten balls. When twenty balls have been selected in this manner, the games is over.

As each ball is forced up, the number is read aloud by the operator, and at the same time is flashed onto every keno board throughout the casino, restaurants, and lounges of the hotel. In this way, no matter where the players might be, they can easily follow the games. It is not necessary for players to remain in the keno lounge in order to play the games.