Sunday Scene in Local Option Montgomery County.
BOYS AND GIRLS DRINKING
Slot Machines in Full Operation for Gambling.
SOME OF THE INCIDENTS
While the good people of Washington were attending church Sunday, just across the District line at Cabin John bridge the depraved were rollicking in high carnival. The day was not propitious for a general turning out, but there was nevertheless a big crowd at the well-known resort, where everything goes. The place recalled the early western mining camps, where no distinction was made as to men and methods, and where everything was “wide open all the time.”
It was a poor commentary on the morals of the capital city to witness the scenes of depravity that were enacted almost within the shadow of the great white dome beneath which laws for the good government of mankind are made. The frequenters of the resort last Sunday were made up for the most part of the lower strata of society, yet there were others present who are well known in the business world of Washington, and there was another class, as much out of place it seemed as a rose in a swamp—young girls who came on bicycles, stopping “just for a minute” to get a drink of lemonade. The excitement of the place seemed to Intoxicate them, and they tarried, many of them to taste for the first time this new sensation of depraved society. They stay perhaps to taste their first drink of intoxicants, ending in the wild orgies that too often form a part of the program at such resorts.
A reporter of The Star visited Cabin John bridge yesterday and came away satisfied at least that some stringent methods are necessary to save the young men and women of Washington who, either through design or mistake, are thrown in contact with very undesirable company.
The Star’s representative arrived at the resort during the morning hours. Few were present at that time and there was no disorder. As the day lengthened into the afternoon the crowd became larger, and at 4 o’clock there were fully 2,000 in and about the hotel. The majority were In the hotel, where scenes of revelry were indulged in with an abandon that would have put the Paris Moulin Rouge to shame.
Slot Machines
Three bars were kept going at full speed dispensing drinks, and the reporter found it difficult to get into either room, they were so crowded. There were men almost at the sunset of life, middle-aged men, those who had but recently reached their majority and, to the resort’s great discredit, boys. Boys, some of them certainly not over fifteen years of age, drinking with a bravado that would have put an old toper to shame. While every available Inch of room was taken at the bar and an anxious, thirsty crowd was waiting an opportunity to get served, there was even a denser crowd in the back of the room. Here three gambling devices were being operated for the enjoyment and apparent loss of the onlookers. The machine is the same that has been interdicted in many states, and so palpably bad and unfair in its influences that the highest courts in California have refused to recognize its patent right. It is otherwise better known as a “coin slot machine,” into which you drop a 5-cent piece with varying results. Upon its face the machine looks fair enough, but it is a percentage game of the most flagrant kind, where the house gets it all. The machine stands about five feet high and is made attractive by the use of polished wood and a beautifully designed disk, which rotates upon an axis and stops upon a certain color.
A Species of Roulette
It might be well to say right here that the disk is under the absolute control of the hidden mechanism, which, cunningly conceived, prevents the house from losing. Left to its own rotations the element of chance would be better for the players. There are five colors represented on the disk. The white is the most important. Should the pointer stop at that color the investor of 5 cents would receive for his pains twenty nickels. There are but two or three “whites” on the disk, and while the reporter watched the game—something over an hour—the color did not materialize. The red comes next in importance. It pays 5 cents to the man who has been lucky enough to pick it out.
The black returns 25 cents to the man who has played that color and the yellow and green only return 10 cents. Each machine was operated by a man, who for a better designation might be styled the “Croupier.” since he calls out the winning colors in a monotonous voice as he spins the wheel. This machine is perhaps the most insiduous form of gambling known. As the croupier very truthfully remarks “one color is bound to win.” In the excitement of the game the percentage of chance on the side of the player is never figured. He does not stop to think that the colors of the wheel are made up for the most part of green and yellow partitions, and that these colors win most of the time. The croupier tells in a loud voice that the green and yellow pay two for one, the white 20, the red 10 and the black 5. But this is just exactly what they do not do. The principal invested each time Is deducted from the winnings. For example, the green wins. According to the croupier the lucky gambler should receive 15 cents, or to use his own expression, “two for one.” But he only receives 10 cents, and it does not take much of a mathematician to figure out the odds against him on such a basis of calculation. But the idea of money coming out in excess of that put in draws the crowd and incidentally the nickels and the house fattens. Of course, where each color is not played, the element of percentage becomes greater for the house. But such was not the case Sunday.
There was a constant crowd about the machines, and each color had a regular patron. Now and then a new comer had the temerity to put a nickel in the slot before the regular player of the color had been given an opportunity, whereupon the latter waxed wroth, and the newcomer was given to understand in plain language that such interference would not be tolerated. It was rather disheartening to see the small boys playing this game, many of them perhaps getting their first taste of gambling, treasuring up ideas of winning and perhaps figuring on ways and means for obtaining the necessary capital with which to take the chance.
Strange Sights
And so all the afternoon the crowd surged in and out the bar rooms, each one of which was provided with “slot machines,” spending the Sabbath drinking and gambling. The reporter marveled how all this could he, in the face of the prohibition laws of Montgomery county and the state laws against keeping open on Sunday. His mental query was answered by a man who said he had charge of the bar rooms and was complaining bitterly to a gentleman on the amount of work he was expected to do. Not conscious of the reporter’s proximity, the gentleman asked the keeper of the bars how it was they were allowed to keep open on Sunday.
“Oh. they don’t say nothin’ to us.”
“How about your bIll to permit you to sell liquor? Did that go through the legislature?”
The man who looks after the bars was evidently not well posted, for he replied:
“Not yet, but It’s going through.”
“Well, how about this gambling?” continued the stranger. “Surely the authorities do not permit that.”
“There ain’t no law in Maryland against it.”
And with this the man who had so much to do along the liquid refreshment line hurried off to another bar room.
“Strange,” said the visitor turning to The Star reporter, “that the great state of Maryland should permit such a desecration of the Sabbath, and that Congress only a few miles off should be unmindful of the interests at the capital city. Go upstairs if you want to see sights to disgust you.”
The reporter followed the suggestion thinking of the exaggeration of the stranger. But there was no exaggeration for the sight at two girls in short dresses, surely not over fifteen years of age in a state of maudlin Intoxication was enough to disgust anyone. They sat at a table only a few yards from The Star reporter. A young man about eighteen, with face flushed, was giving the waiter an order when the reporter arrived, The drinks were soon brought. One of the girls took a sherry cobbler, the other a cocktail, the young man the same. They disposed of them in short order, mixing their drinks with loud talk and laughter. Then another and another drink was served until It seemed as if the girls would not be able to walk. A short time afterward they left reeling. It was a disgusting sight, and as they passed through the parlor where the demimonde were making merry, the latter paused in their revelry long enough to express their disapproval and sorrow. There were other cases, but none so flagrant.
The private rooms were all filled with winers and diners. Here, alas, was an other trap for the unsuspecting. A young girl inside one of these rooms, flushed with liquor becomes an easy prey for the unscrupulous.
The front parlor downstairs on the first floor was a veritable bagnio. Here lewd women flaunted, their objectionable faces and methods in complete abandon and sang love songs, while their “steadies” hugged and kissed them and took other liberties. Now and then the manager or the man of order looked in and stopped the revelries, but as soon as they were out of sight they were taken up again. Be it said to the credit of these two men they did everything in their power to keep order. But order was as hard to find as a Maryland officer to enforce the liquor law, even though the proprietor told The Star reporter that one of the Maryland deputy sheriffs was on hand to maintain order.
It excited no small comment when a respectable party would drive up. They would be ogled until lost in the crowd.
There were no fights, and the Sabbath passed, according to one of the employes, “very quiet, in marked contrast to the prevlous one.” The Star reporter strolled about the grounds, but saw no evidences of lawlessness outside the hotel. In one of the resting booths a group of small pickannies were entertaining a motley crowd with buck dancing to the music of a mouth organ.
As night came on the revelry died out, and one by one the crowd departed, until the Sabbath at Cabin John was only a memory.
The Evening Star, Washington, DC, April 23, 1900