LONDON GAMBLERS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 70, 23 March 1935, Page 4 (Supplement)

LONDON GAMBLERS.

NIGHT CLUB LIFE. LARGE SUMS SQUANDERED. SCOTLAND YARD ACTIVE. Scotland Yard is preparing to' swoop down cm the greatest gamble in London— the .slot machines on wliipb hundreds of] pounds- are lost every night in certain clubs and cafes. Let us toll the story of one of the thousands of shillings'-in-tbe-slot-gamblers seen in a West End Club. He looked tired, and his head was bent over ;i machine. From his pockets lie took a seemingly endless stream of shillings . . . He put a coin in the slot. His hand pulled over a lever. He listened to the whirring as the three drums in. the "works" spun round There was a click, a rattle, and—silence. Another shilling had gone home for the club . . . Twice a Minute. His' spin had failed; the drums, with their painted numbers, had failed to stop in such a way that the three numbers on view yielded one of the winning combinations on which the machine automatically drops a given number of coins into the tray beneath it.

He stood there for three hours. His eyes seldom moved. Occasionally he beckoned a waiter and changed a pound note. Twice a minute, with monotonous regularity ho put in a shilling, his hand swung over, the drums revolved, thu machine clicked, rattled and went silent. Very occasionally there was a clatter of coins as he turned up a winning combination. It was long turned midnight; the dimly lit, badly ventilated room, so small and depressing in itself, was jammed with people, all trying desperately hard to enjoy themselves.

The cabaret came and went. And still the machine chanted its song of hope and ultimate defeat. On and on ... Night After Night. At three in the morning his face was strained, but he still had that queer expression you see on a gambler who is tackling the hopeless task of betting against the book and beating it. The next night it was just the same, and the next night. The picture never changes, although the gambler may vary. All over the West End yOu find them — in the best social clubs, in the night clubs, the drinking clubs, the speakeasies, the cafes, and even in the cheapest little Soho "dives." Sometimes they play for pennies, sometimes sixpences, sometimes florins. Hut the "shilling flutter" is the favourite.

The £5 Jack Pot. Certain combinations of "fruit" or numbers return three coins, some five, others ten, some 14, and some 18. One combination returns the jack pot, sweeping the pool, taking a fixed sum from the "kitty ,, and a whole heap of coins from the "pot" itself, which cau bo seen enticingly at the bottom of the machine. A jack pot on a shilling machine is usually worth £5. Sometimes it may bring in £8, occasionally only £3. And the "mugs," betting against the tin behind the jack pot, pull the lever. Two out of every three sliillings sunk into the machine usually go into the tin. which is cleared every clay, and the proceeds divided according to previous arrangement, sometimes split between the owners of the machine and the proprietor of the club, sometimes going wholly to its owner.

But this never stops the inveterate gambler from plunging.

Profit £200 a Week. Many small night clubs in the West End make a mere £5 a week profit on ordinary trading, but a sweet £40 on their machines. One club proprietor admitted that he made £35 a week from his machines, and ran the club at a shade of a loss. Another club is said to clear £150 off its machines, and yet another, with a "class" membership, banks £200.

One woman, bitten badly by the slot machine fever, is reported to have sunk £10 a night into the. machines of one club. In all she lost £75 —and she never won the jack pot. There are, of course, many clubs at which the machines are run honestly, with a notice displaying the day and time when the last jack pot was won.

But in the slang of the West End the machines are called "diddlers."

There's danger in high heels. You girls who trip along so smartly on your threeinch and four-inch Louis Seize models are courting disaster. For Nathan Hack, a Detroit authority on footwear, declares that ■ those high heels may result in rheumatism, gout, and even temporary insanity in later life.

Steve Kolchurk, a 50-year-old Montreal restaurant proprietor, did not trust banks. So he hid his savings in his wooden leg. Now he has complained to the police that his leg has been burgled of 2100 dollars (more than £400) while he was asleep in bed. He had been saving the money in order to return to Cz.echo-Slovakia, his native land. One day he felt ill and went to bed. When he got up again he looked in the leg to see if the money was safe. To his horror, only 000 dollars (£180) were there, the rest of his savings had gone.