It's the Brian Lair Show on WNYC. I'm Matt Katz. I used to be a reporter here at WNYC,

and today I'm keeping the seat warm for Brian. With sports betting on the rise and state officials deliberating over proposals for three new

casinos in the New York City area, will now take a look at the history of gambling in New York City

with New Yorker staff writer Adam Gopnik. He's got a new piece out, headlined that

engines and empires of New York City gambling,

and he joins us to talk about the kingpins that made New York the national center of

illegal gambling in the last century. Adam, how are you? Thanks for coming on.

Delighted to be with you, Matt.

So before we get into the history of the gambling trade, you wrote that, just as New York

is about to grant a gaming license, the three of eight-bedders looking to build a casino

in New York City.

And I'm wondering if you were hoping to learn about the new era that we're about to enter

in New York in terms of gambling by looking at the past.

Was that sort of one of your intentions, either personally or otherwise? Yeah.

Yes, now I have nothing to say because that's exactly it getting in.

With all of the talk about a new casino, particularly the idea of a Times Square casino,

I got fascinated with what had happened in the

past because New York is both the center of illegal gambling and also sort of a national center

of gambling, but rather than writing what we technically call a thumb sucker, you know, where you

try and bring together the many threads and make, you know, tumid generalizations, I thought I would write about individuals, particular people who had been central to the history of gambling in New York and allow them, so to speak, to pass the torch or the deck of cards from one to the next over the past century, sort of like an anthology musical more than somehow a synthetic

piece.

Very good.

...