Speaker David Levy, collector and historian of card games Date recorded: March 27, 2018 Led by collector and card game historian David Levy, the event celebrated the Library’s recent acquisition of the George Clulow – United States Playing Card gaming collections, one of the world’s premiere collections of books about card games, games of chance, playing cards, and chess. The collection contains almost a thousand volumes that date from the 15th to the 20th centuries as well as archival records that document the development, design and manufacture of playing cards in America. University librarian Valerie Hotchkiss notes that the collection’s chief attraction is its wealth of materials for students and faculty in a wide array of disciplines, such as history, law, economics, mathematics, and foreign languages. “It is also quite fitting that Vanderbilt should be home to this collection because one of its great leaders, Harold Stirling Vanderbilt, played a historical role in gaming as the inventor of contract bridge,” said Hotchkiss. Catherine Perry Hargrave in A History of Playing Cards described the Clulow-United States Playing Card Collection as “one of the most complete and scholarly collections that has ever been gathered together.” The evening event kicked-off with a lecture entitled, “You’ve Got Pirates!” featuring author Edmund Hoyle’s A Short Treaty on the Game of Whist, which Levy considers to be the “most important book ever written about a card game.”attendees participated in a game of whist. David Levy is a historian of playing card games. He actively participates in competitive backgammon tournaments and is so passionate about gaming that he has written software to play the game of trictrac.
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