The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Great Moments In Gambling's History Part 4

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

With Simon on vacation in jolly old England, Action Network host Chad Millman is joined by producer Matt Mitchell for another episode highlights great characters and moments in the wild history of gambling. Today Chad tells a story about criminal enterprises in Lexington, and Matt shares the story of the first American gambling syndicate, and a man called "history's most notorious big money gambler." #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Listen to learn the hard way on the AHA radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Welcome to the favorites, the podcast, part of the volume podcast network. I am Chad Milman of the Action Network. Today, a little bit of a different show. Simon, as everybody knows from the last episode, is visiting with his family in jolly old England. So I am joined because I can't do this solo. I'm no Colin Cowherd. I'm no boss.

of the volume podcast network. I can't go for three hours mapping out my shows like it's a tree with a lot of different branches. There's only one Colin Coward. I need help. So I'm joined by producer Matt Mitchell

for the fourth installment in our series of great stories from gambling's wild history. As you guys know, I've mentioned this a few times. I'm working on this book. I've been traveling nonstop. I've been digging into archives.

I've got a couple great stories that I'm going to share of things that I've learned. Really, really cool stories. And Matt is going to share some stories as well. Matt doesn't even know what I'm going to talk about. So Matt, hi, buddy. Are you excited? I couldn't be more excited, Chad. All right.

So this is direct from my book. I'm giving a little bit away. Chad Millman wrote a book. It's such a good story. Every time I tell it, and Matt, I haven't even told you this, people like freak out. One of the guys who was known as the bookmaker for the mafia, this guy named Ed Curd, lived in Lexington, Kentucky. He was a guy who grew up in Lexington, was enamored with the ponies, started going to the tracks in Lexington,

working in the stables, and very quickly got connected to a lot of different people who were, within organized crime and were also just regular horse betters and very quickly learned that he had a talent for betting on horses. He ultimately became known as one of the best horse betters in the country, but also started to help organize betting on sports as it was becoming more and more popular in the 30s and 40s. Ultimately, because members of organized crime and the leaders of organized crime, they often came through Lexington to go to the tracks and to vacation there. Like, if you came through Lexington, oftentimes you were also going to Arkansas where they had the springs, hot springs. Arkansas was famous for being a casino town, a mini Vegas before Vegas.

and a lot of people would vacation there and get relief in the hot springs and all this kind of stuff, right? All this great, just sort of really fun color about old time betting history and betting stories. Anyways, Ed famously was a bookmaker for the mafia and had this estate in Lexington where it had a secret room. And the secret room, you had to get to it by pressing a button in his den, a wall opened up. and then you could go down a spiral set of stairs into the basement where he had literally dozens of phone wires coming into the basement where he was working his operation running numbers and taking bets and moving money all across the country. Like he was at the center of the country doing this.

It was insane. So I went to Lexington and I was lucky enough that I found the guy who owns his house. house, randomly, like, through various connections and phone calls, reporting, Matt, shoe leather, gum shoe. That's what I do, right? So, got in touch with the guy. I land, I'm talking to a guy for 10 minutes. I'm in Florida.

I'm going to Lexington in two days. I'm telling him what I'm looking for. He goes, why don't you just come by the house? So I showed up at the guy's house at 9.30 in the morning, walks me in, never met the guy in my life, walks me in, total stranger. he goes, you're not going to believe this. Walks me into the den, presses the button, the wall opens up,

takes me down the spiral staircase into the basement. It looks exactly the same. They have not touched it. It is amazing. So that's number one. I got to go and see a very cool piece of sports betting history. What do you think of that?

Stranger lets you right into the house. Incredible. You're America's guest. Honest to God, I was shocked. And you know, it's funny. when I was down there, his wife comes down and she's looking at me and she looks at her husband. He goes, nope, honey, I did not check him out, did not do one Google search. I just sort of felt like I'm going with it.

And here he is. Just this guy with his big gulp full of whatever exotic olive oils, eating macadamia nuts out of a little satchel. He's no, he's no threat. He just sounded like such a sad sack. Like if he wasn't going to get into this basement, he might not be able to write this book. So I'm just going to let him in. And he couldn't have been more lovely. I'm not naming any names.

I'm going to save it all for the book. That's part number one. The other thing, you know what? You tell your story. And then I'm going to go back to something else I've learned. Incredible. Well, it's a testament to how unintimidating you are and such a mensch that someone would meet you and go, you know what? Let me just take you over to my house to show you my secret rooms.

I'm very impressed. Nice job. You were, let me take you into the fucking catacombs of my house. It's no problem. You're, you're trustworthy. You're wearing your little fedora with your little press, little press part in it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Honestly God, it was great. I was, I was more than, more than grateful. Well, Chad, I've got a treat for you. Today, I'm going to tell you two stories featuring two absolute gambling maniacs from the 19th century. I think they will. resonate greatly with our audience, who's also full of degenerates, this kind of aspirational behavior. So the first person we're going to talk about is Brother Elijah Skaggs, the preaching Pharaoh dealer. So as we've discussed in previous episodes, Chad, in the early 1800s, there were like three gambling hotbeds. You had England, specifically London. You had high-end European resorts, like the German spa towns.

And you had America. And in each of these hotbeds, you had like one game that was by far the most popular. In England, that national game was hazard, a dice game that would become basically craps. In the European resort towns, they had my personal favorite roulette, because I'm obviously very, very classy. And in America, the national game was Pharaoh, F-A-R-O, called the game that won the West. And again, not the ancient grain, but a game, a gambling game called... Which, the ancient grain, which I just got to say, it's making a comeback. And it's so good for you.

And it packs in so much nutrients. I've been eating a lot of feral. And you can mix it. It's great with olive oil. I just want to make that PSA. I knew that we should get into the fero game. I knew it would get you all hot and bothered. We talked to ancient grains.

even though I'm not team quinoa. So I get it. You say ancient grains and all of a sudden I'm in a different zone. Yeah, I'm trying to control your emotions as we go through this. Now, the gambling game, Pharaoh, it seems like an absolute blast, Chad. So like poker, you don't need a lot of stuff. And unlike roulette, you could play it virtually anytime, anywhere. But like roulette, it involves virtually no skill whatsoever.

And when you play Ferrolet, you play Ferrolet, you can play Ferrolet, you play against a dealer. And that dealer can be located in a casino, the way you'd like picture it when I say dealer. But a Farrow dealer could also just be an independent person, like an independent contractor traveling from town to town. Because everything you need to play, Farrow fits in a single kit. In America, these were typically small mahogany boxes. And on the boxes, we'd have a picture of a Bengal tiger.

That was the symbol of Pharaoh. inside these little boxes was a layout. It was everything you needed. It was a tray of chips and a deck of cards and like a little felt foldout that you just place on a table and it would have pictures of the 13 different cards on it from two to ace. And this is an audio medium, Chad, primarily. So in the spirit of painting a picture, I'm going to use you as our model for the roving Farrow dealer. So you, Chad, Norman first you learn how to deal Pharaoh.

next you get a little bank roll of cash or a partner who has cash. So that's a question. Yeah, go ahead. In this in this play, do I get a speaking role? Oh, for sure. Yeah, you'll be paid. Yeah, you get paid. You'll get a union scale because you have a speaking role.

Just let me know when it's time for my line because I got a, I think I got one. Well, suddenly it's very easy for you to now start going town to town as like a mobile casino. You have your little kit. you get everything you need. Maybe you make a deal with a local bar. Maybe you're setting up shop in a hotel. Maybe you have a little well-maintained mustache. Maybe you're wearing a snappy little vest with a little pocket watch.

Maybe you look incredible. Maybe you have a little phrase you say like, go ahead. Pharaoh, Pharaoh, get your Pharaoh. Perfect. Yes, you've nailed it. The way you avoid it talking about it. ancient grains and your cell job is perfect. Well, this is what I feel like. The reason I said it is because it could be a little bit of a bait and switch where I could get people who are interested

in gambling and like I'm speaking to the insiders and they're coming in and they're like, oh my God, I get to play Pharaoh. How incredible is that? But if they don't know, they could just be a little peckish and be coming by for a bowl of Pharaoh and they're hungry, I'd be like, oh, no, I mean the game. Let me show you. And then they're so entranc. by my sales job, all of a sudden, they're playing the game, and I'm making bank. A natural salesman. So. Yeah, I see that out so quickly. Incredible. We're truly painting a picture.

I could have survived by my Wiles in the late 1800s. So you and your Wiles, you can head out west. You can go down south. Very easy for you to find a place to set up shop because there's lots of money in it. So people are happy to see Farrow dealers. And I won't dive into the rules, but like as a game, I'll just note that it's quiet, it's fast, it takes up very little space, and it's still very exciting. And best of all, you could be, say, an illiterate Old West minor with like lead poisoning, and you could still learn the rules and remember them pretty easily. So it's really like a perfect game for the era.

So that's the backdrop. The stage is set. Let's talk about our boy, Elijah Skag. So Elijah's born and raised in Backwoods, Kentucky. It's part of a huge extended family. Everybody's gambling, the whole family, the whole area. So he learns how every game works. He loves it.

Who wouldn't? He eventually learns all the tricks of the trade. He learns how to cheat as a dealer, stack in the deck, bottom dealing, all that stuff. By the time he's 21, he's won a pile of cash off everybody he knows in town. And he's like, you know what? I'm taking my show on the road. And he understands strong personal branding, Chad, like you. He dresses in a plain black frock coat, plain suit, white shirt.

Yeah. Yep, white shirt, high collar. He looks a lot like a preacher. So he gets the nickname, the preaching Pharaoh dealer, which he loves because he feels an almost religious zeal for this game because the thing he loved most about it was it's a game that's entirely in control of the dealer. If you mastered the deal, you could control the entire game. So, Skag's packs up.

First, he hits up Nashville, then he spreads out to all up and down the Eastern Seaboard. And if he ever catches a fellow dealer pulling a fast one that he's never seen, he bribes these guys very handsomely to teach him. Because he's a lifetime learner, Chad, just like us. Love of learning. He's traveling around. He's cheating his way into a ton of money.

But he realizes he could only make so much as one guy. And that gives him an incredible idea, Chad. He goes down to New Orleans. He sets up an operation and he's going to run America's first gambling syndicate. He's going to scale. That's right. That's exactly right. So Elijah goes into all the casinos.

He's looking for young gambling recruits. He gathers him up. He teaches him. He trains them relentlessly on how to cheat as faro dealers because he's very good. So he's a good professor. Once these guys are all trained up, He sets them up in teams of two, but he then assigns every one of these duos with one of his dozens and dozens of cousins who serve as essentially the roving pit boss, and he dispatches them

all across the country. He pays all the expenses, and the dealers can keep 25% of what they rake in after expenses. And it works. Chad Norman, it works perfectly. At their peak, he had a hundred dealers running this remarkable nationwide racket and the money is just pouring in. And what did you just say? What's the first thing he does with the money, Chad? Gambles it. No, he scales. He scales.

He scales more. He scales more. Okay, I was wrong. No, I'd be like, he's an incredibly, we'll get to the gambling in a second, but he's still an invest mode. He's a businessman. He's a businessman first. He funds his own gambling house in New Orleans.

Higher ahead. He's higher and ahead. He's getting ahead. He's got a brother. He wants to run a similar racket out in California. And they're not even a state yet. You could do whatever the fuck you want out there. He goes, sounds good.

He bankrolls his brother to open up an operation on the West Coast. And I know you'll like this. He's a patron of the gambling arts, Chad. Elijah funds inventors to help him cheat. He pays inventors to fund new like gambling devices, new crooked Farrow boxes and all sorts of stuff like that. And in return, he gets exclusive usage for one year and then they can sell to whoever they want. And that works too.

He can't stop making money. By the time this guy is 40 years old, his inventor pales have flooded the market with crooked pharaoh boxes. All those dealers are known as cheaters. It doesn't matter. He's two decades into this racket and he retires. This absolute son of a bitch. is a multi-millionaire in the goddamn 1850s. Converting to today's dollars.

Yeah, we're talking about a guy worth like $100 million today, just through cheating at a huge scale, the classic corporate American success story. Herbert Asbury, the journalist and betting expert who wrote the original book, Gings in New York, he said to Elijah Skaggs that more than any other individual, he likely had the single biggest influence on the spread of American gambling nationwide.

This guy was an incredible operator. I've got a nickname for him. Oh, lay it on me. Elijah Skaggs. The Scaling, syndicate, selling, Swindler. Incredible. So you got alliteration?

I mean, a natural author's brain, always working overtime, Chad. Literate podcast. It's an incredibly literate podcast. And, Chad, I'm sure you're thinking, how's the story end? Does they have a happy ending? Of course. Skaggs enjoyed a luxurious retirement, and then, then mid-retirement, he made his two biggest gambols. The first was buying an enormous Louisiana cotton plantation, and the second was investing millions and millions of dollars

into, that's right, Confederate war bonds. So, spoiler alert to any 200-year-old listeners, the Confederacy would go on to lose the Civil War, Elijah would lose his entire fortune, and he died pretty close to penniless in Texas in 1890. And that's the story of Elijah Skaggs, America's crooked Pharaoh King. Elijah Skaggs, gambling pioneer, scaling, syndicate, selling, Swindler. That are war bonds, not a good investment. Here's what's interesting, and it connects directly to my story as I'm researching this book is how so many businesses today were born of illicit ill-gotten gains, right? You could look at the whole gambling industry and say this is built on the back of illegal activity, right? The predominant

purveyors of gambling products through the early 1900s until the 1980s was organized crime and the mafia. And slowly but surely, as more and more states legalized various forms of betting, that transitioned away from being the dominant source of revenue for organized crime into being legitimate businesses that have created Caesars, MGM, Draft Kings, Fandor, Action Network, right? All of these used to be completely illegal businesses that were dominated by organized crime.

Similarly, professional sports, Matt. What if I told you that some of the biggest brands in professional sports were founded by sports betters. What if I told you that? Sounds like high risk tolerance zealots, Chad. Matt. New York Yankees.

I've heard of them. The New York Yankees founded by a man who was known as a degenerate gambler who prominently fixed games was so known for fixing games. He built what was at the time, the largest casino in New York

on 33rd Street in Manhattan. And people had to wonder, as he's sitting in the casino, are the players also fixing the game so he can continue to make money at his casino? New York Yankees, founded by a gambler. How about the New York football giant, still owned by the Mera family.

Tim Mera, famous, famous better, went to Belmont, won $500 at the track, the next day bought the New York football giants. Detroit Lions, founded by a gambler. Cleveland Browns, founded by a gambler.

Chicago Cardinals, still owned by the Bidwell family. Bill Bidwell famously a gambler with significant, hold on, was it Bill Bedwell or was it Charles Bidwell? I don't want to defame anybody. I think Bill was the song. Yeah, Charlie Bidwell, former Cardinals owner,

made a fortune opening racetracks. Also, he was, let me just make sure I get this right, he was a known associate of Al Capone, known gambler, known racetrack owner. Pittsburgh Steelers still owned by the Rooney family. Art Rooney once famously won $200,000, betting on the horses, owned a saloon, allegedly bought the Steelers with gambling winnings. What's interesting about this, by the way, Lamar Hunt, who obviously the chief's founder,

he was the son of H.L. Hunt. H.L. Hunt, who was an oil man in Texas, it is widely known. Like, there are stories about this in, I've got a newsweek, issue of Newsweek from 1960 that includes the biggest sports bettors in the world. H.L. Hunt is listed as one of those sports betters in the oil fields at the poker tables, everywhere else. very well known as a sports better list goes on man it's it's amazing to me and i think that your point is look when people were buying these teams and these professional leagues were starting in the late 1800s early part of the 1900s it wasn't the titans of industry it wasn't the vanderbilt it wasn't jp morgan it wasn't the rockefellers who were going to take their industrialist riches and invest in these nascent sport leagues that were made up of, you know,

blue-collar workers and people who largely weren't educated and were known as sort of people hanging out in bar rooms and brawlin. They weren't going to invest in these professional sports leagues. The only people were going to do it were sports freaks who were probably betting and had a high tolerance for risk. And that's why so many of, of these teams were founded by professional betters. And it could offer something that you can't buy, which would be a, you know, bragging rights, a championship, something that you'd have to earn your way into,

which I think still happens to this day. Correct. Hey, it's us, the Jonas Brothers, and guess what? We have some big news. What's the news, new? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas, we invented a podcast?

Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to a... We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. We're starting a trend. But this one's extra special. So how did we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember.

I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Oh, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band. Before Jonas Brothers was... This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, for people could call in and say, hey Jonas,

and then I wrote down in my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite.

Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The French Open is one of the toughest tests in tennis. And I know firsthand because I competed there myself. I'm Renee Stubbs. And on the Renee Stubbs' tennis podcast, I'm breaking down everything happening at Roland Garris.

Every match, every upset, and what it really takes to win on Clay. Jen she went. I mean, she went down in three to Rabakina, but I'm delighted. She's an outsider to win the French for me. And she likes Clay. Listen, Lena Rubakina is arguably the best player in the world right now. And I actually can win on any surface. Because if she's serving, well, good luck.

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and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. Give me one more story, Matt Mitchell. All right. This is the story of John Betta Million Gates, the most notorious big money gambler in American history. And that's our buddy Dave Schwartz, so said with some authority. So John Gates is an absolute degenerate. Absolutely love to gamble.

If you look up his face, looks like it belongs on U.S. currency. Looks like Rutherford B. Hayes. It looks incredible. And one of my favorite things to do with this stuff, chat, is learning how these old, like, gambling whales, how they get rich in the first place? Because that's always interesting to me. Because he didn't come from a wealthy family.

And with John Gates, that's a really, that's a fun place to start. So just as Eliza Skaggs, our boy is buying his Confederate war bonds. Our guy, John Gates, is being raised on an Illinois farm just west of Chicago, and he hates it. And if any of those 200-year-old listeners of ours are near you, they'd happily tell you, He hated it because it's hard and it sucks. Like there's no mystery about why working on that farm wouldn't be appealing. One summer, he gets paid by a neighbor to clear some timber from the property.

Then he gets to keep the timber and he cuts it up and he sells it as firewood down at the railroad station. It's actually a pretty savvy racket. Get yourself paid twice, right? He hates that too because it's really hard and it also sucks. So eventually, he's hanging down so much down at the railway that the railway that the rail. Howard workers are like, hey, do you want to come play in our card game? And they teach him how to play Pharaoh, which he likes right away, because it is very fun. And pretty soon, John's like, man, playing cards is way better than working. I like this a lot more. He gets good at playing

poker. He wins some money. And basically he's like, I'm not, I'm not running this work racket anymore. This sucks. Playing cards is way more fun, which like, same. Same dude. I feel you. Eventually, though, he meets a nice girl. He has to get a real job. job because he wants to marry her and all that. Can't just be a guy that plays poker behind a locomotive. So after a couple fall starts, he gets up. He's trying to run a hardware store. It goes under.

But when he's doing that, a salesman comes in and introduces him to a brand new invention called barbed wire. He sees this invention and he's like, man, this shit is dope. Everyone's going to need this. So he goes, okay, let's do it. I'm going to quit the hardware store and I'm going to go. No. Like, this is, this makes perfect.

sense. He understands immediately the value. He goes, I'm going to go to work for one of these guys that sells this. He goes down to Texas and all the ranchers meet him. And they're like, holy shit, John Gates is incredible. He's just a degenerate like us that wants to gamble with us all day. So he's becoming very popular. And he's got bales of barbed wire. Well, here's the thing, Chad. Gates knew these ranchers have a big problem on their hands, right? And do you remember favorite contest winner Daniel from Bowbells, North Dakota? Very well. He was one of our highlights. I hope he's listening right now because he is an absolute gem of a guy.

Yeah. Do you remember what he spent his $40,000 prize money on? Tractor, I believe. Cattle. He bought cattle. That's right. That's right. So our pal, Daniel would definitely have understood the problem these ranchers are facing. They own tons of open range now, which is kind of brand new. They need a way to close in these enormous parcels of open land. They need to keep livestock out of other people's crops because that cost them money. They need to keep their livestock off the fucking railroad tracks because that screws with everybody. And cattle that are miles apart from each other

don't get it on. They don't produce enough cabs. So using any normal fence material like wood with literally bankrupt ranchers. You can't make a 15 mile fence out of wood out there. So Gates is like, great, I'll just explain this to everybody in Texas. And they are like, absolutely not. We don't want any of your barbed wire. And they either think it's some kind of trick or that it'll hurt their animals and it won't work. Or that generally it's just some kind of racket that Yankees are trying to run on the South because there's still a lot of distrust there for many of, you know, Yankee big ideas,

which you can't blame them. I get it. So Gates stops playing cards. Yeah, elitist. It's an elitist in betcha. exactly. So Gates stops playing cards for like one second and he's like, I've got an idea. I'm going to make this big insane bat. He stages a cattle stampede in military plaza in downtown San Antonio, which is still there as like a public demonstration. And it proves that barbed wire is a safe and effective tool that they can use. And it works perfectly.

He makes a fortune in sales. And he goes to the owner of the company. He's like, hey, I'm, killing it. I want to go into business with you. Let's be partners. Owner says no. He goes, all right, I'm out. He goes to St. Louis. He finds another guy making barbed wire. And he says, hey, let's go into business together. They sell even cheaper. And they're killing it. And eventually, Gates old boss sues them for using identical equipment. And for the record, it was very similar, but it was not identical. Anyway, Gates and his partner know that if they get served papers, they're going to have to shut down. And if that happens even for a little bit, they're cooked. So they come up with another insane gamble. While hiding from process servers,

like in a bad 90s movie, they rent a small building directly across the Mississippi. That's their new headquarters. And in the middle of the night, they hire dudes to take all their machinery down to the river, loaded onto a ferry, push it across the river, and dock it on the opposite bank in East St. Louis, Illinois, outside of the court's jurisdiction. It pays off. They continue operating. They continue making barbed wire. John Gates is a genius. Blah, blah, blah. Company gets huge. They eventually merge with U.S. Steel owned by J.P. Morgan. Gates becomes a bazillionaire and becomes enemies with J.P. Morgan, the richest and most powerful person, probably in American history, which is another whole hilarious story. But that's how Gates becomes this kind of loaded guy.

stock markets crushing. He invests. He makes more money. And now, now, Chad, he can get out of his mind gambling. He is gambling amounts of money that made me think, oh, that's just how it was back then with these robber barons. And the other robber barons are like, no, that's not how this works. This is not how any of us are. This is insanity. And I'm going to show you how. First thing, he's like, you know what? I'm going to need a clubhouse to gamble in. So he pays $30,000 a year for a giant suite at the Waldorf Astoria in Manhattan. He lives in Chicago, but he's like, I'm doing making money in the stock market. It makes sense for me to keep a place to Waldorf Astoria. The hotel hates his guts because he's literally using it as a private gambling clubhouse.

The suite has a private entrance, private elevator, and still the amount of noise him when his buddies are making is like out of control, true. robber barren fat cat behavior. This guy has a south side Chicago mansion that's still there. It's just on the other side of the I-90 Express from Rate Field where the White Sox play, not where I'd build my mansion today, but that's fine. He'd gather up his Chicago buddies

and they'd get on the train to New York City to party at the Waldorf. And there were reports that these guys would go on Benders where they'd play a cash poker game for four uninterrupted days and nights. They'd start in Chicago at the train station. They'd play for the two-day overnight train ride. They'd freeze the game. They'd move into the suite at the Waldorf. They'd play two more full days and nights with millions of dollars changing hands. Huge amounts of money. And I'm looking to see like,

oh, I'll paint the picture. I'll look up where it was taking place. This is as they're still planning, Union Station and Grand Central Station. That's how long ago this was. His wife obviously knows she married a fucking gambling demon, but she reportedly didn't like it. Like these week long gambling free for alls were like, that's a little much for her. So she tried to break them up. But instead of just trying to limit these benders to like a couple days, Gates learned a trick that I think, I assume you've done several times, Chad. Let me know if this sounds familiar.

In his suit pocket, he'd keep a few giant loose diamonds. And if his wife was really mad at him, he just fish went out and say, hey, honey, I just on this, why don't you do something nice with it? And she'd just walk over to Tiffany's and they'd have it set. And that would usually buy him like a day and a half, just like you and Stacy. That's how we live, Matt. Yeah. I mean, everyone needs to buy time. Everyone's time is valued in a different way, Chad. Except instead of diamonds, I give her bowls full of Pharaoh. Yeah. You give her ancient greens. Yeah. She knows that's my low language. You're so mad at me. It seems like you're hungry, but you don't want the bloat.

Have I got great news for you? There are reports of him betting the equivalent of $100,000 on coin flips. Multiple times, he won close to a million dollars at a single horse race, which is how he got the nickname, bet a million gates. There's no indication he was actually good

at betting on the ponies. But the president of the jockey club eventually asked him to please limit his bets to 10,000. a race because the sheer scale of his wagers was starting rumors that the races were fixed. And when our guy, Dave Schwartz, calls him the most notorious big money gambler in history, like that's the kind of behavior that earns that title. When operators are like, bro, you are betting so much money, all reasonable people are

thinking, this guy must be cheating because what is happening is like unimaginable. But I'm going to end the story of John Gates with my favorite anecdote because he bets on something so insane that I never even considered it. On at least two separate fully witnessed occasions, once on a train ride from Chicago to Pittsburgh, and again in a clubroom at the Waldorf Astoria, John Gates and another man bet the modern equivalent of almost $1 million on which of two raindrops on a window would go to the bottom of the window first. Both times Gates won. And that's the story of John. Bet a million Gates.

John, bet a million Gates, Elijah Skaggs, two Americans infamous for their ability to wager insane, uncomfortable amounts of money. Matt Mitchell, as always, bringing the color, bringing the flavor, bringing the Pharaoh directly to our listeners. The favorites will return with our next episode on Tuesday. on the Action Network YouTube page. We're talking NBA draft. Download us from Spotify, Apple Pods, wherever you get your pods. Rate, review, subscribe, leave us five stars. Say whatever you want. Feedback is a gift. Until next time, love you.

Action Network reminds you. Please gamble responsibly. If you or someone you care about has a gambling problem, help is available 24-7 at 1-800-gambler. Hey guys, it's us. The Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We get to ask other people to do podcasts.

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Listen to Humor Me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Last night, a blown call changed the game. This morning, the internet lost its mind, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where SportsSlice comes in. I'm Timbo, and every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the biggest moments in sports and giving you the real story behind the headline.

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