| Put & Take tops were very popular
from the 19th century to about the 1940’s. They could be
carried in ones pocket and used anytime in a bar or other
gathering place for an impromptu gambling session. Each player
would contribute chips, coins or currency to a pot. They
would take turns spinning the top. Some tops had six sides,
others eight sides. The roots of the game can be traced
far back -- four-sided
Hebrew Chanukah dreidel and Victorian England pub
games. Other web sites: Thomas' Spinning Tops Collection,
here (Arjan Verweij dice home
page), and here
(Arjan Verweij put and take page), and here . If it landed T1, T2 or T3, the player who spun it would win (take) 1, 2 or 3 chips, respectively, from the pot. If it landed with the star or “Take All” showing, he would take all the chips from the pot. If it landed P1, P2 or P3, he would lose (put) 1, 2 or 3 of his chips, respectively, into the pot. If it landed "0" or “Put All” or “All Put,” he would have to match the pot or lose all his chips or each player would have to contribute to the pot, depending on the rules. In the many pictures below are some of the over 50 Put and Takes in my collection, plus some similar horse racing and dice tops. Be sure to see the last set of pictures, which show how Put and Take tops can be rigged for cheating! |
| Pictured above are the most
common type of Put and Takes. They were usually
small, about an inch high, and made of brass. They can be
distinguished from each other in a variety of ways, as is apparent
on this page. ¶ In groups "5" and "7," above, the words are lined up with/go in the same direction as the stem of the Put and Take top. In the other groupings the words are upright/perpendicular to the stem. ¶ In group "1" and "3" the tops are 'bi-level." That is, there are two independently moving parts. In "1" the P's and T's are on the top level and the amounts (1, 2, 3, etc.) are on the lower level. Also in "1," some of the tops represent two dice. In group "3," generally the pay-off odds are indicated in the top level, and the name of a horse is on the bottom level; the horse-betting ones have the name of famous race horses and were copyrighted in the 1920's. ¶ In groups "4" and "5," the letters have no serifs (those short, fancy hanging lines at the ends of the letters), while in "2" and "7" there are serifs. ¶ The tops in group "6" are made of sterling. ¶ The tops in "2" and "4" are 8-sided. The others are 6-sided. |
| These are other miscellaneous
metal Put and Takes. A number of them are sterling.
Note the different sizes. One near the upper
left is a pin. The dark one near the upper right is
a cube-shaped metal Put and Take. Just below it is
a 4-sided top. The two at the lower right and lower left
have internal spinning dials. The reddish one near the top
has a needle and thread inside. |
| These Put and Takes are non-metal.
About half are made of catalin; others bone, wood,
celluloid and ordinary plastic. Some are bi-level. Three
of them are mechanical lead pencils that are to be rolled for
the Put and Take effect. Two of the tops are celluloid advertising
pieces -- one touts Manbeck's Bread ("A winner everywhere");
the other says "You don't gamble when you buy Trenton Crackers."
The white 4-sided one at the bottom is made of ivory. The
one next to it is 4-sided wood. The red one next to it is
plastic with a compartment for solid perfume. |
| These are Put and Take punch
boards and punch cards. |
| These are combination games
that include Put and Take (also called Plus and Minus
on one). The bottom one is made of wood. It
is, among other things, a roulette wheel. It is 14"
in diameter, was copyrighted 1933 by the Cardinal Co., Dallas,
Texas. |
| The above three pictures show how a Put
and Take can be rigged for cheating. The typed instructions
came with the rigged tops when ordered from a gambling
supply house. The scanned instructions and catalog page
are from the K.C.. Card Co.-Mason & Co. "Blue Book" (copyright
1932), which at that time had offices in eight major cities across
the U.S. Notice how the middle ones are nice and symmetrical -- straight/fair/honest. In both pictures, notice how the tops on the right are shaved on the lower right side of the "T2" face, and the tops on the left are shaved on the lower left side of of the "T2" face. Knowing this would give a favorable percentage to the user; he wouldn't always win on every spin, but would come out a winner in the long run. These are 8-sided tops. The "takes" are opposite each other (for example, opposite the "T2" is a "T3"). Likewise with the "puts." So it would work this way, using the top on the left as an example (the one where the left bottom of the "T2" face is shaved some): if you spun the top clockwise (as a right handed person ordinarily would), it would more often land on the "put" side because if the top slowed down near the "T2" side, it would continue past the extra rounded (shaved) edge and land on the adjoining Put side (or as the Instructions put it more simply: "When spun to the right, a Put will show....."). And as you would expect, on this top, all four of the Take sides are shaved on the bottom left, and on all four Put sides, all of the bottom rights are shaved. Just the opposite would happen if you spin the same top counterclockwise or the top on the right clockwise. |
