Poker expert gambler or hustler Answers This page will help you find all of CodyCross Answers of All the Levels. Through the Cheats and Solutions you will find on. Jan 24, 2018  ads CodyCross Answers Casino CodyCross Casino Answers displayed and are sorted by the answer’s word length. So please take a minute to check all the answers that we have and you will find the right answer for your level. In case you couldn’t find. Nov 12, 2017 Poker expert gambler or hustler Answers. CodyCross is an addictive game developed by Fanatee. Are you looking for never-ending fun in this exciting logic-brain app? Each world has more than 20 groups with 5 puzzles each. Some of the worlds are: Planet Earth, Under The Sea, Inventions, Seasons, Circus, Transports and Culinary Arts. Just in case any of you don’t know, ‘Comp Hustling’ is a pastime indulged in by regular visitors to casinos. Hustling needs no commentary surely and the “Comp” part is an abbreviation of complementary, aka freebies. Jul 26, 2019  Hustler's tool, maybe; Poker expert gambler or hustler; Hustler's request; Shot seen in the hustler in church at end of service 'fast' guy in 'the hustler' Hustler acting like a fox without compassion; Famed pool hustler; Pool legend portrayed by jackie gleason in 'the hustler' Big red machine hustler 'the hustler' locale 'new jack hustler' rapper.

1. Poker Expert Gambler Or Hustler
2. Gambling Documentary

Alvin Clarence Thomas (November 30, 1893 – May 19, 1974) was an American gambler, golfer and hustler better known as Titanic Thompson.

Thompson traveled the country wagering at cards, dice games, golf, shooting, billiards, horseshoes and proposition bets of his own devising.^[2] As an ambidextrous golfer, card player, marksman and pool shark, his skills and reputation were compared to 'Merlin himself'.^[3] Writer Damon Runyon allegedly based the character Sky Masterson, the gambler-hero of 'The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown' (on which the musical Guys and Dolls is based), on Thompson.^[4] In 1928, Thompson was involved in a high-stakes poker game that led to the shooting death of New York City crime boss Arnold Rothstein, then called the 'crime of the century'.^[5] The following year he testified in the trial of George McManus, who was charged with Rothstein's murder, but later acquitted.

Early life[edit]

Thomas was born in Monett, Missouri but raised mainly on a farm in the Ozark Mountains a few miles from Rogers, Arkansas, 50 miles further south. His mother remarried (following desertion by his father Lee Thomas, a gambler himself). Thomas began conducting his nomadic, lucrative career of hustling in the rural south-central United States about 1908, leaving home at age 16 with less than a dollar in his pocket. Unable to read or write effectively, he had attended school only sporadically, and felt unwelcome in the home of his stepfather. Thomas spent most of his youth developing skills he would use later, such as shooting and understanding odds at card games through marathon dealing of hands.^[6]

Military service[edit]

Thomas was drafted in early 1918, several months after the United States entered World War I. Following basic training, where he excelled, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant. Thomas remained stateside, trained younger draftees, and did not see overseas service or combat before the war ended in November 1918, when he was discharged. Thomas also taught gambling skills to many of his trainees, and then proceeded to win substantial money from them. He ended the war with more than $50,000 in cash, and used much of this money to buy his mother a house in Monett, Missouri, his birthplace.^[6]

Gambling style, and favorite bets[edit]

Later, when Thompson had honed his skills, he became a 'road gambler', a traveling hustler who became an underground legend by winning at all manner of propositions, many of them tricky if not outright fraudulent. Among his favorites were: betting he could throw a walnut over a building (he had weighted the hollowed shell with lead beforehand), throwing a large room key into its lock, and moving a road mileage sign before betting that the listed distance to the town was in error. Thompson once bet that he could drive a golf ball 500 yards, using a hickory-shafted club, at a time when an expert player's drive was just over 200 yards. He won by waiting until winter and driving the ball onto a frozen lake, where it bounced past the required distance on the ice.^[6][7]

Thompson's partners in 'the hustling game' included pool player Minnesota Fats, who considered Titanic a genius, 'the greatest action man of all time'.^[8]

Thompson's one weakness, as he admitted, was betting on horse racing, where he lost millions of dollars during his life in failed bets.^[6]

Becomes expert golfer[edit]

Blessed with extraordinary eyesight and hand-eye coordination, he was a skilled athlete, crack shot and self-taught golfer good enough to turn professional.^[9] Raised in a poor environment far from exclusive golf courses, Thomas did not take up golf seriously until he was in his early thirties, but improved very quickly during an extended stint in San Francisco, where he took lessons from club professionals and honed his skills. From then on he played several times per week for the next 20 years. In an era when the top pro golfers would be fortunate to make $30,000 a year, Thomas (who, after a misprint in a New York newspaper, let people think his name was Thompson) could make that much in a week hustling rich country club players. Asked whether he would ever turn professional, he replied, 'I could not afford the cut in pay'.^[9] Hall of Fame golfer Ben Hogan, who traveled with him in the early 1930s for money games, later called Titanic the best shotmaker he ever saw.^[6] 'He can play right- or left-handed, you can't beat him', said Hogan.^[10] One hustle of his was to beat a golfer playing right-handed, and then offer double or nothing to play the course again left-handed as an apparent concession. One thing his opponent usually did not know was that Thomas was naturally left-handed.^[11] Thomas' genius was in figuring out the odds on almost any proposition and heavily betting that way. He also had to perform under pressure, and most often did.

Own your own casino. You may be quite surprised to learn that starting your very own online casino could take as little as 5 minutes and, getting the ball rolling is a lot easier than you may think. Online casinos are enormously popular with all demographics and internet users. In fact, online casino gambling is the.

As he aged, Thompson liked to pick promising young players as his golf partners. Several of these who went on to later PGA Tour stardom included young and unknown Ben Hogan, Ky Laffoon, Herman Keiser and Lee Elder. Other well-known golfers who left behind first-hand documented accounts of their dealings and matches with Thompson included Harvey Penick, Paul Runyan, Byron Nelson and Sam Snead, all of whom were inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame.^[6]

Marriages and family[edit]

Married five times, Thompson fathered three children, all boys, with three different wives. He was also romantically linked with many women. Among his alleged trysts were actresses Myrna Loy and Jean Harlow.^[6][12] He typically married a young woman, lived with her for a few months, then returned to his road hustling, while leaving comfortable housing and financial support for his newly divorced wife.^[6]

Killings[edit]

Thompson killed five men. The first was in 1910, in rural Arkansas, when a man named Jim Johnson accused him of cheating at dice and threw him off the boat on which they were traveling (and which Thompson had recently won when gambling with its previous owner – a friend of Johnson's). When Thompson climbed back on board, Johnson drew a knife and threatened Thompson's girlfriend, who was also on board. Thompson seized a hammer and struck Johnson several times on the head before throwing him overboard. The unconscious Johnson drowned. Thompson showed no remorse, stating it was Johnson's fault for not being able to swim. The sheriff gave Thompson a choice: standing trial, or handing over the deed to the boat and leaving town, which he chose.^[6]

The other four men Thompson killed were shot by him in self-defense when they tried to rob him of gambling winnings. Two were killed in one incident in St. Louis in 1919 (the local police chief thanked him for killing two wanted bank robbers).^[6] The third came in St. Joseph, where Thompson and his hired bodyguard between them shot two men attempting to rob a poker game (again, the victims were known criminals and no charges were pressed).^[6] Thompson's last killing came near a country club in Texas in 1932 when he shot a masked figure who was holding him at gunpoint. This turned out to be sixteen-year-old Jimmy Frederick, who had caddied for Thompson earlier that day in a winning match. The dying Frederick confirmed to witnesses that he had been trying to rob Thompson.^[6]

Arnold Rothstein case[edit]

On November 4, 1928, Arnold Rothstein was murdered, allegedly because he refused to pay his debts from a poker game, held several months earlier, that he believed to have been fixed. This game had been organized by George McManus, who stood trial for the murder the next year, in a proceeding heavily covered by the media. McManus was eventually acquitted due to lack of evidence, and no one else was ever tried for Rothstein's death.^[13] Thompson had been present at the game, and an active participant in it; and it was he who, in association with one Nate Raymond, allegedly fixed the game, leaving Rothstein with total debts estimated at $500,000. Thompson, who was not present at the shooting, gave evidence at McManus's trial, without revealing his own role in the poker game. Rothstein had stood to recoup his losses by successful heavy bets on the 1928 elections of Herbert Hoover (new president) and Franklin Delano Roosevelt (new governor of New York), which did take place, shortly after Rothstein's death. Thompson later told close friends that he knew the real killer had been Rothstein's bodyguard.^[6]

Origin of the nickname[edit]

In his own story, published in Sports Illustrated in 1972,^[2] Alvin Thomas, listed as a co-author, said:

In the spring of 1912 I went to Joplin, Missouri, just about the time the Titanic liner hit an iceberg and sank with more than 1,500 people on board. I was in a pool room there and beat a fellow named Snow Clark out of $500. To give him a chance to get even, I bet $200 I could jump across his pool table without touching it. If you think that’s easy, try it. But I could jump farther than a herd of bullfrogs in those days. I put down an old mattress on the other side of the table. Then I took a run and dived headfirst across the pool table. While I was counting my money, somebody asked Clark what my name was 'It must be Titanic,' said Clark. 'He sinks everybody.' so I was Titanic from then on.

Trevino vs. Floyd match[edit]

In the 1960s, Thompson settled in Dallas and, although approaching 70 years of age, kept up a good standard of golf, and frequently hustled games at Tenison Park, a municipal golf course, and at posh Glen Lakes Country Club. Mid-decade, Thompson sponsored a young Raymond Floyd, then early in his PGA Tour career but already a winner, in a big money stakes match against Lee Trevino, then an unknown assistant pro, in El Paso, at Trevino's home course. After three days of play, honors and bets were equal, with both players well under par each round. Trevino gained confidence from the match, and within a few years became a Tour star himself, while Floyd's career also ascended.^[6]

Later years[edit]

Thompson was honored at the first World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, Nevada in 1970. He lived out his final years in a nursing home near Dallas. Thompson had made gambling trips with eldest son Tommy for many years, but after his father died, Tommy, who also had become a skilled, successful gambler, gave up gambling for a church ministry and later counseled prisoners, preaching to convince others to stay away from gambling.^[6]

References[edit]

1. ^Social Security Index
2. ^ ^abThomas, A. C.; Shrake, Edwin (Bud) (October 9, 1972). 'Soundings From Titanic'. Sports Illustrated. Retrieved April 24, 2013.
3. ^Dobereiner, Peter, ed. (1982). The Golfers: The inside story. William Collins & Sons. ISBN978-0002163859.
4. ^Breslin, Jimmy (1991). Damon Runyon: A Life. Houghton Mifflin. ISBN978-0899199849.
5. ^Golf Digest, May 1996
6. ^ ^{abcdefghijklmno}Cook, Kevin (2010). Titanic Thompson: The Man Who Bet on Everything. W. W. Norman & Company. ASINB004EF8MK2. ISBN978-0-393-07115-3.
7. ^Bradshaw, Jon (1987). Fast Company. Vintage. ISBN978-0394756189.
8. ^Fats, Minnesota; Fox, Tom (2006). The Bank Shot and Other Great Robberies: The Uncrowned Champion of Pocket Billiards Describes His Game and How It's Played. Lyons Press. ISBN978-1592287017.
9. ^ ^abLeCompte, Tom (August–September 2005). 'The 18-Hole Hustle'. American Heritage. 56 (4). Archived from the original on May 7, 2006.
10. ^Penick, Harvey; Shrake, Bud (1997). The Wisdom of Harvey Penick. Simon & Schuster. ISBN978-0684845081.
11. ^Kaplan, Michael (July–August 2002). 'All Bets Are On'. Cigar Aficionado. Archived from the original on February 4, 2010.
12. ^Dennison, Matthew (January 14, 2011). 'Review: Titanic Thompson - The Man Who Bet On Everything'. Retrieved April 24, 2013.
13. ^'Tammany's Rothstein'. Time. New York City: Meredith Corporation. December 16, 1929. Retrieved January 12, 2019.^{[permanent dead link]}

As far as a pure American character, it’s hard to beat Titanic Thompson, who won and lost more than $10 million during his long life as a top-notch gambler, confidence man and hustler.

While our grandfathers used wrenches, welding torches and hammers in their jobs, Thompson’s tools were much different: Both right and left handed golf clubs, throwing rocks, a bowling ball, a pool cue, horseshoes, a shotgun, target pistols, decks of cards and cash. Lots of cash.

Born Alvin Clarence Thomas dirt poor in the Ozarks in 1892, Thompson used his wits, athletic ability, guts and guile to become one of the biggest players during the 20s and 30s. His marks included the biggest gangsters of the time, including Al Capone, as well as some of the best golfers who ever lived. He took Thompson after a newspaper misprint. Titanic was given to him by a man who lost a bet to him.

In the days when poker was a game people played at their own risk, Thompson was one of the best. He could mark and set a deck in seconds and had more ways to cheat a game than a politician has to ask for money.

Although Thompson never played in a World Series of Poker event, he was the co-host along with actor Chill Willis, at the first one. They used to give trophies to the players back then. Thompson’s read World Series of Poker — Living Legend — “Titanic.” He was 78 at the time.

Best poker promotions. Bonus Code for Betonline Poker. The BetOnline Poker bonus is a 200% match on your first deposit between $50 and $2,500.This means that if you deposit $1,000 into your BetOnline poker account, you will be eligible for a further $2,000 in poker bonuses! Jan 02, 2020  BetOnline Poker Promo Code NEWBOL Details. When you make your first deposit at the BetOnline poker room, the house will double it. This promotion is available to all accounts making a valid deposit for the first time. This promotion is valid on all deposits of at least $50 and up to $2,500.

An amazing slight-of-hand artist, he learned some of his skills from Houdini himself. Golf, pool and poker, he taught himself. He was naturally ambidextrous, a master of psychology and completely numb when it came to betting stratospheric amounts, and he used all components to travel the country, rubbing elbows with some of the biggest stars at the time, and taking things from them.

In five occasions – six if the murder of gangster Al Rothstein is counted – he took lives. Four of the men he killed were considered self-defense, but details surrounding the death of the first man are a little murky. Officially ruled a drowning, the man died after being bashed in the head by Thompson, who then threw him off the boat they were on. Thompson blamed the man, said he pulled a knife and it was his fault he couldn’t swim.

Rothstein was killed during a poker game in which Thompson helped fix. Rothstein was down to a tune of $500,000, when things turned ugly and Rothstein ended up shot full of holes, refusing to name the trigger man. Thompson wasn’t there when the bullets flew, but that didn’t stop the press from putting the heat on him. It made him famous. The murder cost him $12,500 he lost in a civil suit against the Rothstein estate.

He’s won and lost more than that many times just swinging a golf club.

Golf Murderer

Thompson used to hang around golf courses and try to drum up suckers by starting the betting low, say a $1 a hole. Before the round was over, the stakes would double and triple to as high as Thompson could get them. An article published in the Milwaukee Journal in 1935 gives a glimpse into how Thompson would operate. In this case, Thompson ended up the loser.

The article starts: “Titantic Thompson tried to put over some crooked work on the golf course waiting for the Rothstein case to blow over. The Broadway gambler, whose real name was Alvin Thomas, offered $5,000 and the split of the profits to two good local amateurs if they would let him beat them. He had a sucker on the string for $50,000.”

The article goes on to tell the story of Thompson running into a guy named Max Shimon, who was Milwaukee’s Brynwood’s golf course “top hand for many seasons.”

Shimon shows up for his Sunday match only to find Thompson near the first tee. Thompson asks if he could play along with him, and immediately a $1 a hole bet is established.
“At the eighteenth tee the stranger (Thompson) was $25 down, due to some doubling on various holes.

‘Shoot the last hole for $50,’ he suggested. Max demurred.

‘No guts, eh?’ sneered his opponent; so Shimon shot for $50.

Titantic – that’s who it was – sank a 25-yard approach for a 3 and won.”

But Thompson wasn’t done with Max. Seeing he had a player, he found Shimon again the next week.

‘Let’s make it $100 a hole,’” said the gambler. ‘Or haven’t you the guts?’

‘I can take you anywhere for any amount,’ answered Max. ‘I’ve only got $300 with me but I’ll shoot that. When it’s gone I’ll quit.’

Thompson pulled out a roll and spread 21 $1,000 bills. ‘I’ll shoot till the 21 grand is gone,’ he said.”

Shimon won $1,100 that day. Thompson found him a week later, and Shimon again took $1,200 off Thompson. Thompson then offered to shoot him for one hole for $18,000, the rest of his roll. When Shimon said no, Thompson offered $1,000 to $500 at the toss of a coin. The golfer said no and walked away, which is probably the best thing a man could do when dealing with Thompson.

This was especially true on the golf course. If Shimon stuck around, he would have most likely ended up broke. Amateurs were only good for a certain amount of money. The real money was to be won from the professionals.

Poker Expert Gambler Or Hustler

Thompson would win and lose more in one day on the golf course than the top professional golfers at the time would win in a year. He said this was the reason he never went pro.
From the fantastic Titanic Thompson: The Man Who Bet on Everything by former Sports Illustrated editor Kevin Cook:

He was America’s original proposition gambler, always on the move, one step ahead of his prey and the law — and he did some of his best work from tee to green. He hustled country-club golfers for $20,000 a hole while elite pros like Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson were earning $10,000 a year. He once drove a ball more than 500 yards. “The best shot maker I ever saw,” Hogan said. “Right- or left-handed, you can’t beat him.”

This leads to perhaps the most salient point about Thompson and his space he occupies in the non-existent Hustler’s Hall of Fame. He was so good he could’ve lived a very nice life as a straight man, but his personality wouldn’t allow it. He always had to figure out ways to make life more difficult for the men he tried to fillet, many of which were friends.

Again, an excerpt from Cook’s book:

He seldom trusted skill alone. The great poker player Johnny Moss, who hustled golf on the side, once bet a man $5,000 that he could shoot 45 or better for nine holes using only a 4-iron. Titanic appeared out of nowhere and bet $3,000 against Moss. “They didn’t know it, but I’d practiced for days with that 4-iron,” Moss remembered. “I’d even given the green keeper a hundred to keep the cups where I liked them.”

On the first hole Moss missed a three-foot putt. The same thing happened on the next hole — his ball was heading for the cup when it veered off. Moss realized that someone had tampered with the cups. (It was easy, Ti admitted later: “You just reach a pocket knife under the rim of the steel cup-liner and lift it a little.”) So Moss sent a friend to the third green to step on the hole and push the liner back down. “Ti’s conniver is on the fourth green raising ‘em up and my man’s on the third stomping ’em back down,” Moss said. 'It went on like that for a hole or two, till Titanic stepped out of the crowd.

I said, ‘So it was you?’ Ti just grinned. I told him I’d call off my man if he called off his. I shot 41 and took all the bets.'

He was also known to magnetize the metal golf cups and win bets by using a golf ball with a steel center.

Here’s some more examples of Thompson’s schemes:

Bet a peanut vendor he could throw a peanut across Times Square. Took peanut from the cart, palmed it, and threw a shell weighted with buckshot against the Astor Hotel. He did the same thing over and over with lemons, supposedly once winning $500 off of Al Capone.

Gambling Documentary

He bet people he could drive 500 yards. Once the suckers were lined up, he drove to Lake Michigan, frozen in the winter, and crushed one across the ice.

He would move signs spelling out millage to the next town, then coolly say something like “it won’t be long now, about five minutes,” setting up his driving companion like bowling pins.

He was an expert with the pistols and rifles he kept in the truck of his car and was crack shot. He often won bets by shooting a silver dollar a consecutive number of times from yards away.

Yet…

He’d bet people he could shoot a silver dollar out of the air with a .38. Once he got the bets, he’d palm the silver dollar he just showed everyone and toss into the air one with a hole through it.

He was a switch-golfer. He could play as well both right and left handed and would sandbag millionaires to increase the round wagers. Finally “squeaking” out a match win, he’d offer his sucker double or nothing while playing the opposite hand he’s played the first few matches.

He did the same thing in pool.

He wasn’t above pretending he was drunk.

His eyesight was supposedly a major advantage. He’d minutely bend, crease, and scrape cards and was able to see his marked cards from across the table. His sleight of hand skills were terrific, and he could mark a deck within minutes. It would be a bad idea to let him deal.

Thompson died May 19, 1974, at the age of 82, in Texas. His long life included undressing movie stars and sinking puts for thousands of dollars. He was limited only by his imagination and the physical world.

As a poker player, he’s maybe the most glaring omission for the Poker Hall of Fame. Maybe the purest hustler to ever live, it’s an honor he no doubt deserves.