Talk:Dead man's hand

Items from before split

Dead Man's Hand

• According to http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_307.html, the fifth card was the two of spades.
• According to http://www.rgpfaq.com/dead-mans-hand.html (reg.gambling.poker faq), no-one agrees what it was, but it gives 4 possibilities, none of which are the two of spades, perhaps this should be mentioned on the page?

The above two references are wrong and out of date. There is no credible contemporary source that mentions the cards held by Hickok. If you know of one, please let me know. As a matter of fact, please quote your earliest cite for what cards he was holding, and what is your earliest cite for his cards being called a "dead man's hand." This is a 20th century invention.

I need to check Rosa(his biographer) tomorrow, but I'll be changing this and other things in the next few days unless you have info that would convince me otherwise. Samclem 19:27, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

In the role playing game Deadlands and its sister CCG Doomtown, the dead man's hand is the Black Aces & Eights with the Jack of Diomand

Aces & Eights / Eights & Aces

For anyone who cared to pay attention, it was obvious that "eight and aces" was a typo. "Eights and Aces" is correct. "Aces and Eights" is also valid. [[User:Rex071404|Rex071404 ]] 00:12, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

1. [1]
2. [2]
3. [3]
4. [4]
5. [5]
6. [6]
7. [7]

Made-up stuff

[The contents of this section moved "back" to Talk:List of slang names for poker hands, after coming to this title in a Talk-page-only move; it concerns List of slang names for poker hands, but not Dead man's hand. --Jerzy(t) 03:18, 2005 Jan 5 (UTC)]

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Items from after split

Split into Talk:List of slang names for poker hands and Talk:Dead man's hand

Upon the creation of Dead man's hand as an article, rather than a redirect to this talk page's article, Talk:Dead man's hand was "given custody of" the history of the talk page that had been built up under the title Talk:List of slang names for poker hands (since 2 of the 3 talk edits): that is to say, Talk:List of slang names for poker hands was renamed Talk:Dead man's hand.

At that time, the section #Made-up stuff was removed from here and moved (back) to Talk:List of slang names for poker hands and Talk:Dead man's hand (since it concerns what stayed on List of slang names for poker hands.
--Jerzy(t) 03:18, 2005 Jan 5 (UTC)

Seven-card hands?

Is the seven-card hand discussion really necessary? It's unnecessarily confusing, not particularly interesting in my opinion, and I'm not a fan of paragraph-long parentheticals. Also, I'm not sure about the applicability - Hickok wasn't playing a seven-card game when he drew aces and eights. lesmana 07:36, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

         I would agree with this, it seems pointless and confusing to me Wardenusa 04:22, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Confusing Intro

"The term "dead man's hand" certainly predates the Hickok connection which only occurred in the mid-1920's." I think that this is saying that nobody ever applied to term "dead man's hand" to the Hickok situation/cards, something like that. But it reads as if it might be saying Hickok was only killed in the mid-20s, which (of course) isn't true. Since this is the introductory paragraph, I think somebody should edit it. (I don't want to edit it myself because, honestly, I'm not sure what it's meant to mean.) Bill Hickock was shot and killed in Deadwood South Dakota on August 2, 1876.

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removed ... The term "dead man's hand" certainly predates the Hickok connection which only occurred in the mid-1920's. ... gibberish ... J. D. Redding 00:52, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

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I'm a little condused as the intro is now (17 of May 2007)

The origin of the name, legend has it... at the time of his murder (August 2, 1876) which is ... The term, before the death of Hickok, referred to a variety of hands. The earliest found reference to a "dead man's hand" is 1886, where it was described as "three jacks and a pair of tens.

Note: August 2nd 1876 was before 1886

Sorry to be so confusing. I'm a serious researcher, but sometime come here too short of time and screw up. If someone wishes to reformat my info, I'll be greatful, otherwise I'll try to improve on it on Friday of this week.

The connection between a "dead man's hand" and Hickok only appears in print in about 1920. There has never been anything before that.

But, a "dead man's hand" has been found from 1886 and has many different meaning to many people from that time until 1920. There is NO evidence that the term originated with Hickok's shooting. None. And most likely it didn't.

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Here's some links ... [8][9][10] may help to find info ... J. D. Redding 23:47, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

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Found a good link ... [11] ... says "Charlie Rich, a young part time gambler and card dealer dealt him the hand". The Bio may be wrong. J. D. Redding 00:13, 9 June 2007 (UTC) (PS., note that this book [12] states that he found 2 errors in the Rosa Bio Book ... so it may be not that reliable (since the errors are about the things relating to his death) ... ... it's on page 552 of Six-Guns and Saddle Leather: A Bibliography of Books and Pamphlets on Western Outlaws and Gunmen By Ramon Frederick Adams)

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One final thing .. it may have had other meanings (and I'd like to know what) ... but since Rich dealt the hand and the word got around .. this is the major source of the term and it's popularity IMO ... something to that effect should be stated in the intro.

But keep looking for the origins I'd like to find that out. J. D. Redding 00:35, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

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Lead cleanup?

I was thinking of making some minor changes to the lede:

1. instead of the date of Hicock's murder in parentheses maybe say "...his murder on August 2, 1871, ..."
2. Moving (and maybe rewording) the sentence about the many claims as to the identity of the 5th card to the beginning of the next paragraph
3. Rewording the remaining second paragraph to make it more clear that he may not have had a 5th card in his hand

Also, what if we organized the Pop Culture section into subsections like Books, Movies, Games, etc? - Callowschoolboy 14:12, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Be Bold. J. D. Redding 03:04, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

The hand in popular culture

I found the list of popular references interesting. I can see the point that is was longer than the rest of the article, but the short paragraph cuts a lot out. Maybe a compromise? Eleven even (talk) 18:42, 19 February 2008 (UTC)