Roughest Poker Game Ever
Movies like to depict what rough poker games are by putting people in situations where they might be playing with a few shady characters here and there. However, even Hollywood can’t depict what used to go on at the Bird Cage Theatre in Tombstone, Arizona.
If you’ve ever seen the movie Tombstone with Val Kilmer and Kurt Russell then you know that Tombstone wasn’t exactly the nicest place to live. Gun fights were common and gangs such as the “Cowboys” ruled the town and made Tombstone a very scary place to live. The poker scene is even shown some in the movie too as Kilmer’s character. Doc Holliday, plays a game against some ruthless criminals.
Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t show too much more about a poker scene which was riddled with bullet holes and lost lives over the years. And many of these rough games took place at the Bird Cage Theatre which has 140 different bullet holes in the walls proving that it was one of the toughest poker venues in history.
Going even further, 16 gun fights took place in the Bird Cage and 26 men died in these gun fights as well. Some of the deaths happened after poker games too which meant that you had to have nerves of steel just to play in them. Of course, the Bird Cage wasn’t all about deaths and danger though when it came to poker.
The Bird Cage was also known for having the longest running poker game in history since it ran non-stop for 8 years, 5 months, and 3 days while featuring a $1,000 buy-in. And this was back when a $1,000 buy-in was extremely high stakes! Seeing as how most casinos and card rooms like to shut down their operations for at least a few hours each night, I don’t think this record will ever be broken.