His full name was Nicholas Andrea Dandolos, but he was known throughout the
gambling world as “Nick the Greek”.
Nikos 'Nick the Greek' Dandolos (Greek: Νίκος Δάνδολος; April 27, 1883 – December 25, 1966) was born in Rethymnon, Crete and was a professional gambler and high roller.
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- Nick the Greek was gold. To poker aficionados, Dandolos is most famous for facing off against Johnny Moss in 1951, in a spectacle that is linked to the beginning of the World Series of Poker.
Nick Dandalos was born in Crete in 1883. During his life, he won and lost an
estimated $500 million.
But that’s not an accurate statement-since he died over 50 years ago, it’s
only fair to account for inflation and translate that into today’s dollars:
He won and lost $15 billion of today’s money during his life.
He went from rags to riches and back to rags again dozens of times.
He did all this as an independent gambler, too. He never had anyone staking
him. If he had a marker, he paid it, and he was always on time, too.
This is Nick Dandalos’s story.
A Portrait of a Gambler as a Young Man
Nick Dandalos was raised rich. His father sold rugs. His godfather built
ships. His childhood was a life of privilege, and he earned a degree in
philosophy from the Greek Evangelical College. He moved to the United States
when he was only 18, but unlike many immigrants, he came here with more than the
clothes on his back.
His grandfather gave him a $150 weekly allowance. That doesn’t sound like
much now, but this would have been in 1901. Accounting for inflation, that would
be $4000 a week in today’s money.
We don’t care where you live. $4000 a week is enough to live on, especially
for an 18-year-old.
It was fashionable at the turn of the century for well-to-do families to send
their young men to the United States with an allowance. The goal was to provide
him with an education.
Nick the Greek sure got one, but it wasn’t quite what his family had in
mind.
Dandolos started his life in the United States in Chicago, but it didn’t take
him long to move to Montreal.
What did he do there?
He gambled on horses after befriending a jockey named Phil Musgrave. It
didn’t take him long to use his keen mind and education to get a good grasp of
probabilities and how to use them to his advantage.
He won over $500,000 on horse racing in a single season. That was a fortune
then. He could have done anything he wanted to.
What did Nick the Greek want to do?
He apparently wanted to move back to Chicago and lose his fortune playing
dice and cards.
He got good at those games, though. When he played cards or dice in a casino,
he was an attraction. His personality surely helped. And he often won or lost
$100,000 during a session.
In fact, he once lost $1.6 million playing craps in New York. That craps
session had gone on for 12 days straight. It’s probably the biggest loss in the
history of the game.
The Poker Career of Nick the Greek
Below we share some of the anecdotes we’ve heard about Nick the Greek’s
career as a poker player.
Nick the Greek Makes a Poker Player Cry
Nick Dandalos once bought into a stud poker game for $20,000. After 7 hours
of hard play, he’d won over $500,000. The biggest post during that session was
$150,000, which he won when he had four of a kind (10s), and his opponent had a
full house with aces and jacks.
But that’s not the most interesting part of the story. Those are just numbers
and hands.
The other player had been rude and insulting to Dandalos throughout the
session.
At the end of the session, Dandalos challenged him to cut the cards once for
$200,000.
The other player lost. He slumped in his seat and started crying.
Apparently it doesn’t pay to be rude to one of the greatest gamblers in the
world.
Little Al from Wherever: Nick the Greek and Albert Einstein Gamble Together
One of the more entertaining anecdotes about Nick the Greek’s exploits
involves his escorting of Albert Einstein to various poker games-either in Las
Vegas or in Manhattan-the details aren’t entirely clear. Depending on which
version of the story you hear, Nick introduced Albert Einstein to the other
poker players as “Little Al from Princeton” or as “Little Al from Jersey”.
In some versions of the story, this took place in Vegas, but according to
Dandalos’s memoir, it was actually set up by the State Department and happened
in Manhattan. Since poker for money was illegal in Manhattan, Dandalos insisted
upon assurances from his friend in the State Department that they would make
sure that the law didn’t get involved.
Another Double or Nothing Story
Another anecdote we often see related is about Dandalos gambling with a high
roller from Texas. Dandalos was up a million dollars, but he got tired and
wanted to call it a night.
The Texan accused him of being a chicken.
Dandalos asked for a new deck of cards. He shuffled them, asked the Texas to
cut the cards, and offered to bet the entire million on which of them got the
higher card.
The Texan lost this game of chicken, and Nick Dandalos got to go home and get
some much-needed rest.
Johnny Moss, Benny Binion, and the Inspiration for the World Series of Poker
You’ve heard of the World Series of Poker, right?
What if we told you that Nick the Greek started the World Series of Poker?
It’s true. In January of 1949, Nick Dandalos sat down to play heads-up poker
with Johnny Moss. They played every game imaginable, too:
- 5 Card Draw
- 5 Card Stud
- 7 Card Stud
- 7 Card Stud High-Low
- Ace-5 Lowball
- 2-7 Lowbal
And the game lasted almost 5 months. The two players only stopped to eat and
sleep.
It was actually the brain child of Benny Binion, a master promoter. It was
meant to be a tourist attraction, and boy did it work. They played every day in
the foyer of the Horseshoe Casino.
It later became the inspiration for the World Series of Poker.
It’s hard to imagine two more distinct styles of play, either. Nick Dandalos
was well-educated, well-spoken, and talkative. He’d beat practically every poker
game on the East Coast at this point. By contrast, Johnny Moss wasn’t
well-educated, and he’d spent most of his career playing poker in Texas in
private games. He was quiet and introspective.
Moss turned out to be the better poker player. Dandalos lost between $2 and
$4 million to him.
He ended this first WSOP by telling Moss: “Mr. Moss, I have to let you go.”
The Low Rolling Years and Death of Nick Dandalos
When you gamble for large sums of money long enough, you inevitably face
periods where you’re up a lot of money and other periods when you’re down a lot
of money.
Dandalos himself estimated that he had won and lost a fortune at least 73
times in his life.
But in his later years, he was almost broke. He played poker for $5 a hand in
his twilight years.
Someone asked him how he could be interested in gambling for such low stakes
when he used to bet millions at a time.
Nick Dandalos replied, “Hey, it’s action, isn’t it?”
He stayed in action even when he was tired and sick. He even had physicians
treating him while he was at the poker table.
He died on December 25, 1966. He was broke.
It’s estimated that over the course of his life he had donated over $20
million to charity.
Hank Greenspun, found of the Las Vegas Sun, famously called him the “King of
the Gamblers”. Here’s what he wrote about his friend:
“Luck was a lady and she has been the love of his life.”
He was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame 13 years later-at the same time
as his once-rival, Johnny Moss. They were the first two players to be so
honored.
Nick the Greek is the subject of two books:
- Ted Thackrey’s 1968 volume, Gambling Secrets of Nick the Greek, is mostly nonfiction about how to gamble like Nick Dandalos.
- Harry Mark Petrakis’s 1978 novel, Nick the Greek, is a fictionalized account of Nick the Greek’s life.
Conclusion
You won’t find many more interesting characters in the annals of gambler
history than Nick the Greek. From his origins as an actual Greek from a wealthy
family, Nick Dandalos distinguished himself in multiple ways.
But as a gambler, his biggest claim to fame is the fortune he won and then
lost again repeatedly throughout his life.
Early Life of Nick ‘the Greek’ Gambler Legend to Be
Nick ‘the Greek’ gambler legend to be, was born on the island of Crete in 1883. Raised in a well-off family, his family were hard-working and entrepreneurial types, making a living selling various commodities such as silk, linens, and textiles. An academic from a young age, the adolescent Nick Dandolos chose to study philosophy at a local catholic institution. At the age of 18, in an effort to enhance his horizons and discover his calling in life, Nick’s father gave him a handsome allowance and sent him on his way to the United States.
Arriving in Chicago, the young Nick was completely overwhelmed by the liberal laws and the general distaste for authority that existed in the city. After entering into a relationship with a young American woman, and subsequently ending it on bad terms, Nick would continue on his adventures heading towards the Quebec capital city of Montreal. It was here that he discovered his love of gambling, and was introduced to horse racing. After learning the intricacies of the sport, he began to bet heavily, one day striking big and landing a $500,000 pay-day. This first win ignited a fire in the belly of the young Nick, who was slowly maturing and becoming a notoriously brazen gambler.
Nick Dandolos
Nick ‘the Greek’ Poker and Gambling Mastery
After his big win on the horses, Nick decided to return to Chicago where he quickly sought out many other forms of gambling, such as dice, cards, and poker. It was in poker that Nick discovered his passion for gambling, and quickly began developing his skills in the popular card game, becoming a master of many variants of poker. His talent did not go unrecognized, and his appearances at local casinos would cause huge commotion with fascinated spectators watching Nick ‘the Greek’ poker talent showcased live.
Nick became an absolute master of the bluff, and would often leave his opponents feeling incredibly manipulated due to his formidable powers of persuasion, use of body language, and unorthodox wagering styles. By this point, Nick Dandolos had become a celebrity in Chicago clubs, betting enormous sums of money on highly risky events like dice-rolls, or high stakes card games. His wealth skyrocketed but quickly tumbled on several occasions throughout this period, as the young Greek truly became the most well-known gambler across the country in the 1920s.
When the law banning gambling in the State of Nevada was lifted, Nick ‘the Greek’ decided to permanently relocate to Las Vegas, a city that had already become the gambling capital of the world. The sin city was perfectly suited to the intense demand that Nick ‘the Greek’ had for high-quality gambling establishments, but more importantly, they were also willing to take his astronomical betting wagers. After several years making a name for himself in Las Vegas, casino owners and mafia bosses regularly approached Nick to have him work for them as an affiliate partner, but Nick resisted. Throughout the entirety of his betting career, Nick ‘the Greek’ Dandolos never worked for anyone but himself.
Nick Dandolos Birthday
Battle of Poker Giants: Dandolos vs Moss
The culmination of Nick ‘the Greek’ Dandolos’ talent as a poker player, his entertainment value, and the extremely high-value betting capacity he possessed made him incredibly hot property throughout Las Vegas, every casino wanted a piece of him and many quite literally begged him to visit. One such industrious owner was Benny Binion, who managed to arrange for Nick to face off against Johnny Moss in a poker match, Moss was chosen quite simply because he was one of the only gamblers on the planet who could match Nick’s high-value bets. The two elite poker masters caused a spectacle and crowds flocked to Binion’s casino to get a piece of the action.
Over the course of five months, Dandolos and Moss went head-to-head in a series of poker battles, with the game variant constantly changing to keep the audience interest peeked. Week after week huge cash flows were going back and forth. Until one fateful afternoon, Nick ‘the Greek’ had played his last hand, having just lost $4 million he announced to his opponent famously, “Mr. Moss, I will have to let you go.”
Nick Dandolos's Birthplace
Years later, the memory of this epic battle lives on. The World Series of Poker credits its initial inspiration to start long form competitive poker tournaments to the legendary match between Nick ‘the Greek’ Dandolos and Johnny Moss. If you want to try and channel some of Nik’s talent, then head over to our top online poker sites or try your hand at casino poker.
Playing for the Love of the Game, Not the Money
Nick Dandolos
Nick ‘the Greek’ Dandolos was a man who often mixed with the rich and powerful. On one such evening, playing in a VIP poker game with the likes of the Egyptian King Farouk I watching on, Nick cleaned out New York mob boss Frank Costello. As Nick began to leave Costello yelled at him claiming he was a coward for leaving, Nick immediately handed a deck of cards to the King of Egypt for him to shuffle, and invited Costello to a single highest card draw, with the winner taking $500,000. Costello lit a cigar, picked up his coat, and left the building without saying a word.
Nick Dandalos
Moments such as these defined Nick ‘the Greek’ Dandolos, and he was also a charitable man giving away today’s equivalent of over $400 million to charities. Although his fortune at the time of his death had dwindled away, he continued to play poker to the very end. Just a few months before his death, an admirer spotted him playing poker for pennies and asked him how can he play for such small amounts when he has gambled millions back in the day, he replied: “It’s still poker, isn’t it?”. The pure love for the game of poker – rather than the astronomical sums of money he won over his career – may very well be the true gambling secrets of Nick ‘the Greek’ Dandolos.