1935

Stanford University’s (California) Indians and Southern Methodist University’s (Texas) Mustangs were to vie in the Rose Bowl football game on New Year’s Day, and this meant trains of people traveling from The Lone Star State to Pasadena.

Texas officials warn any gamblers with ideas of operating games of chance on those trains that special agents will be on board to curtail such activities. (The game odds favored the Mustangs, yet the Indians won, 7 to 0.)

Photo from freeimages.com: by J. Hodge

Quelling the 1954 riot at the Missouri State Penitentiary in Jefferson City

1955

In a longstanding tradition, Missouri State Penitentiary inmates were allowed, on New Year’s Day, to gamble with their prison savings while playing dice and card games with each other.

The warden, however, rescinded the privilege after the deadly, destructive riot inside the facility in fall 1954, during which convicts set fires and fought law enforcement officers with handmade weapons.

Photo from the Missouri State Highway Patrol