Blackjack Expert and Economist Dies at Age 67

The famous gambling expert, who was also a well known economist, Bill Eadington, died last Monday in Crystal Bay, Nevada.

He visited Las Vegas in the late 1960’s together with his brother-in-law. His interest in gambling initially begun with his brother-in-law placing bets at blackjack tables. He wanted to use his mathematical expertise in playing cards as he learned the game from watching. He was encouraged when they had won about $1,000 and thought of using his skills in becoming a professional gambler.

However, luck was not on his side at first and he began amassing a steady losing streak, so he proceeded to graduate school instead and headed to California.

A sociologist commented that Eadington had every intention and purposes of creating a field of gambling studies inclusive of subfields of various table games.

The American Gaming Association voted Eadington into the 2011 Hall of Fame where he joined the great company of the likes of Wayne Newton, David Copperfield and Donald J Trump.
Last year, the National Council on Problem Gaming awarded him a lifetime achievement award where served on one of their boards. It was the professor’s strong opinion and belief that groups with opposing ideas and opinions about gambling will have greater progress if they work altogether rather than criticizing each other.

He wrote in 2003. “There is still much heated rhetoric that argues on one hand that commercial gaming is ‘nothing more than a modern form of entertainment’ and on the other that it is ‘one of the most pernicious evils to be thrust onto an unsuspecting public.’ However, the reality clearly lays between these extreme public relations positions.”