The Nation - News from April 12, 1989

Voters in Deadwood, S.D., the Black Hills town where Wild Bill Hickok was shot to death in a card game, approved a return to legalized gambling. City leaders hope games of chance will revive the economy and plan to use proceeds to restore historic buildings and public facilities. The measure to legalize poker, blackjack and slot machines received 690 votes to 230 votes against. Hickok, a U.S. marshal and frontiersman, was shot in the back of the head in 1876 during a poker game in a saloon called No. 10. Legend has it he was holding a pair each of aces and eights, known since as the “dead man’s hand.”