Keno History
Early Origins
Keno history begins, strangely enough in ancient China with a rhyming children's poem. The poem was called The Thousand Character Classic and was used to teach children to read, because it had one thousand characters that did not repeat. As such, it was memorized by most Chinese and was used as a means to count to a thousand.
By 200 BC, Cheung Leung, the famous Chinese general, faced a financial crisis with his people. They were overtaxed and war-weary from years of conflict. The citizens were becoming hostile and near the brink of rebellion if Cheung Leung dared to raise taxes again. Yet, the general knew without additional funds, the barbarians would crust his imperiled kingdom.
The idea of a wall was proposed, a huge wall to keep the Northern barbarians at bay, or at least slow them down and impede them to change their path to a locale that was more to Cheung Leung's benefit. But again, the general had no means to build a wall without money.
So, Cheung Leung invented a game, based on the first 120 characters of The Thousand Character Classic, that required players pick a set of characters to pick. Then, he would draw random characters and declare a winning combination. For people who lived in the far flung lands of his domain, doves were used to send the results. The game became to be known as he White Pigeon Game, and peasants fought each other for the opportunity to play.
Cheung Leung's coffers overflowed with new money without having to over tax his people. His army was rebuilt, the Great Wall of China was constructed, the Han Dynasty was saved, and keno history began.
Keno comes to America
Keno history trumpeted on, without much change, other than dropping the 120 characters to 80. The White Pigeon Game then remained unchanged for a few thousand years. Then, in the 19th Century, Chinese railway workers brought the game with them to the American West. Over time, the characters were changed to numbers to keep it simple and to permit non-Chinese speakers to play. The game remained underground, due to anti-gambling statutes, and became a huge pastime for the Chinese immigrants in San Francisco, and was known as the "Chinese Lottery."
Keno goes legit
During the depression, some non-Chinese ran a lottery in Montana (where it was illegal). Warren Nelson worked there and decided to open up his own. Federal authorities didn't take kindly to it and shut him down several times. When gambling became legal in Nevada in 1931, keno history would finally make a major turn. Nelson moved to Reno and opened the first keno game in the Palace Club in 1936. Joe Lydon, also from Montana, opened the first keno game at the Fremont in Downtown Las Vegas.
The Chinese Lottery was, in every way, a type of lottery, but lotteries were still considered illegal by Nevada gaming laws. So, casino operators called the game "Horse Race Keno" in order to circumvent the law, and the game came to live in the casinos. The idea was that the numbers represented a fictional horse, and players tried to predict the outcome of fictional horse races. Even today it is often called "the race game" or just "the races." Keno, back then, was the name for bingo. It hasn't been used for a few generations, but since Nevada gaming law outlawed "lotteries" but didn't outlaw "keno", Nelson started to call it Horse Race Keno to keep a step ahead of the law.
Horse Race Keno worked like this: 80 numbers were written on pieces of paper and put into small tubes. For each game, twenty numbers were drawn. Eventually, these papers became wooden balls that everyone called peas. But later, Warren Nelson was on vacation in Long Beach, California, and saw a wire cage with numbered ping pong balls that was used for prize giveaways. Nelson snatched one up and took it back with him to Nevada.
One legacy of the Chinese Lottery still exists in Keno. That is the term "spots." Originally, Chinese Lottery and Keno cards were prepared by marking spots on the numbers the player wanted with a camel hair brush and ink, just like Chinese calligraphy. Only two places in Nevada still do this: The Club Cal-Neva in Reno(owned by Warren Nelson) and the Showboat in Las Vegas.
Eventually, the US government decided revenue from off track horse racing was to be taxed, to the casino operators again took the destiny of keno history into their hands and dropped the Horse Race part and just called the game "Keno." In 1963, Nevada limited pay outs to $25,000, then in 1979 they raised it to $50,000. By 1989, the limits were abolished and casino-operated keno began to pay out enormous jackpots.
Today
Keno history rolls on. As more casinos are built around the world, Keno figures prominently in the planning. The Internet also had no small affect on keno history. Today there are keno drawings and massive pay outs that would have made the Nevada Gaming commission sweat, even during the golden age of Las Vegas. You can play online keno at any of our online casinos. If you do, don't take for granted the 3000 years of keno history or forget about Cheung Leung's clever invention that made it all possible.
Edward O'Connor - News Reporter