Reno’s Last 7-Card Stud Game

I learned to play poker in West Springfield, Virginia, after my friend Barry Wilson invited me to play. We were high school freshmen, and the guys we ended up playing against were juniors and seniors. We both lost. In the coming weeks, we improved, but we were still dorks.

To finance poker, Barry got a job at Village Inn Pizza. I sorted $50 bags of pennies for old coins and occasionally found Indian heads worth three or four dollars each. I think Barry had an easier time, but I adapted to the poker game more quickly.

I moved back to Walnut Creek, California, at sixteen, bought a car with my poker and lawn-mowing money, and settled into my junior year. I was lucky enough to meet friends like Bill Jornlin, Bruce Parker, Pat Berry, Rusty, Ron, Carol, Sharron, and Cathy, who were terrific. The guys and I played plenty of poker, and by 18, I was playing at the nearby Pacheco Inn. At nineteen, I tried my luck in Lake Tahoe. It went like my first game in Virginia.

This was in the late ’70s, and California had only low-ball games, while Lake Tahoe’s casinos across the state line in Nevada had only 7-card stud. In Reno, there were over a dozen casinos with poker tables, and 7-card stud dominated every room. By the mid-’90s, most rooms had more Hold’em than stud games, and California low-ball was gone. Unfortunately, by the year 2000, half of the casinos in town had dropped poker altogether, and when I first wrote this in 2017, there were just six places to play: the Atlantis, Club Cal-Neva, Eldorado, Grand Sierra, Peppermill, and the Sands. Only one offered a 7-card stud table.

Eldorado Poker

At the time, the Eldorado had offered poker for over 25 years. It went through a dozen managers, opened and closed, and moved around the growing casino, but during the summer, I found the last 7-card stud game in the state: a $1-5 game with a short waiting list, so I gave it a play for old times’ sake. After a small win, I knew I’d only find 7-stud games in home games afterward.

The same $1-$5 limit was commonplace at clubs like Harrah’s and the MGM 30 years earlier, so not much had changed. Inflation only affected the rake, which had risen to $4 from the 10 percent and $2 maximum of yesteryear.

I lived in North Vegas and worked in the poker room at the Bingo Palace. They featured 50-cent to $1 7-stud, and I propped the game. When I moved to Reno in 1983, the 7-stud game at Harrah’s was my favorite. Most days, it opened at 10 am with Doc, Buffalo Bob, me, George, and maybe a few tourists. It ran for $1-5, with $10 at the end (after the last card). I’ll bet I played in that game 500 times in two years. After I learned Texas Hold’em at the Mr. “C’s” casino attached to the Sands and was ready to move up from their 25-cent to $1 and $1 to $3 game, I moved to the $2 to $10 Hold’em game at Harrah’s at noon.

Harrah’s had 11 tables tucked neatly into a quiet spot by Valet parking on Center Street, next to the sportsbook. Then, they moved the room to the main hotel casino, where Keno had been for twenty years, killing half their action.

Then they moved poker to the Bus area on Center Street. By then (1990), it was almost all Hold’em, although sometimes I would see Mills Lane, the Washoe County District Attorney and boxing referee, in a low-limit stud game. That killed the rest of the action, and a few years later, the poker games were gone.

Reno Poker Today

Today, you can find poker outside of town at the Grand Sierra, which offers seven tables. Downtown, the Silver Legacy has 13 tables, and the Cal-Neva has five. Harrah’s closed several years ago. Mr. “C’s” closed in the ’80s; so did the Onslow, Silver Spur, Horseshoe, Sahara Reno, Flamingo, and Zimba’s, all of which had poker at one time or another. The Eldorado is going strong, but poker is finally gone.

A few miles from downtown, the Atlantis offers eight tables, and across the street, the Peppermill has 19 tables and the town’s largest tournaments. It’s a good room with steady play, and the buffet is terrific.

As for accommodations, Reno has many friendly hotels and casinos with very reasonable rates. Rooms are at their highest during holidays and events like Hot August Nights. The Eldorado has hundreds of rooms, eight restaurants, a fitness center, and a pool. There is also a business center and free parking. The property is connected to the Silver Legacy, which is connected to Circus Circus, so you can stay inside during stormy weather and enjoy three large casinos, making your trip more convenient. But still, 7-Card Stud is but a memory. A good one for me; how about you?

Down in Vegas, poker was “saved” by Benny Binion at the Horseshoe – in huge cash games with “Nick the Greek” Dandolos, Every-day Nobody’s, and Johnny Moss back in ’49 – and again with the World Series of Poker. Those stories are highlighted in Vegas and the Mob.