Edward O. Thorp

The blackjack game like any other game has some outstanding players who would be classified as professionals. This is because of their unique performance in the game. They stand out due to their exemplary performance which beats most of the contemporary players who have been recorded in the past years. In the group of such people is one outstanding player by the name of Edward Thorp who was one of the first pioneers in the blackjack hall of fame.

For most players of the blackjack game, Edward Thorp needs no introduction, having been born on 14 august 1932, in Chicago; it is believed that he was the inventor of the card counting technique popularly used by blackjack players to date. In card counting, the players learn tricks on how to master all the cards that have been dealt on the table with an aim of trying to fore-tell which cards could still be in the hands of players or the dealer.

Edward Thorp - Introducing Card Counting to the Player

Although Edward Thorp has been prominently acknowledged in the blackjack gambling circles, he was a man of great academic achievements as well with degrees in mathematics and masters in physics, he even had a chance to teach mathematics and finance at the university of California between the years of 1977and 1982. Besides these achievements, Thorp however did not hit fame until he ventured into blackjack gambling and carried out extensive research on the technicalities of the game eventually coming up with the card counting technique which turned out to be the first mathematics based system that grossly reduced the dealer's advantage when playing the game.

After carrying out his extensive research on the game, he went ahead to make use of an IBM 704 computer to test the reality of the card counting technique. To make sure that his findings were actually practicable, he went ahead to try it out in some of the casinos in Las Vegas with much success leading to the many casinos becoming wary of him even as other blackjack players adored his style. He latter compiled his research into a book known as Beat the Dealer which was to become a best seller in the New York times list.

Edward Thorp - Other Achievements

Following the outstanding success of the first book "Beat the Dealer" Edward Thorp did not stop at that, he went on to polish his research on the game leading to the introduction of a revised edition of the technique which was called the High-Low technique. With more success on this book as well, he latter ventured into finance and co-authored another book known as "Beat the Market" with S.T. Kassouf. This however did not mean he quit writing on gambling.

All this time, he used to write a column in the gambling times magazine which were latter to be compiled into a book by Lyle Stuart. Even with all the books in his name, Edward Thorp still went ahead to team up with Jay Regan to come up with one of the first market neutral hedge fund. To crown his achievements in the gambling process, Edward Thorp confirmed his extensive understanding of the gambling techniques by teaming up with Claude Shannon to invent the first wearable computer which casinos outlawed.