Federal Writers' Project – Life Histories/2021/Spring/105i/Section 22/Ed Walls

Overview

Ed Walls was a white man born in North Carolina. He was a professional gambler. Walls was interviewed by the Federal Writers Project on May 10, 1939.

Biography

Early Life

Walls was born around 1899. It is unclear where he was born. His mother was a prostitute. Walls was her illegitimate son. When he was around 12 years old, his mother began keeping other prostitutes in the house, and eventually sent him to live with a family in another part of town. At a young age, he started gambling. He didn’t like school, and often skipped classes to go to poolrooms or gambling clubs. His mother supplied him with spending money, and he often had more than the other boys.

Professional Gambling

When Walls turned 20, his mother died. As a result, he had to support himself independently. He made his money playing pool, cards, and Craps. For the next five or six years, he moved to multiple locations, gambling professionally. When he wasn't gambling, he practiced playing pool, using marked cards, and using loaded dice. When he turned 26, Walls began renting a place above a store and started his own gambling house. He made his money by cutting the pot off games he hosted, otherwise known as raking the pot. By the time of the interview, Walls is "nearly forty years old," and had spent the years continuing to improve his gambling skills and run his gambling house.

Regrets

In the interview, Walls discusses his life regrets stemming from his decision to pursue a life of gambling. This excerpt from the interview summarizes his feelings:

"I am nearly forty years old, and as I look back I can see that I have missed out on all the good things in life. I never married, just whored. I don't know what love is. I have no friends. How could I have? I am just a crooked gambler, living with a whore, down to my last ten spot, and behind with the rent. No wonder I am sick of it."

For about 10 years, Walls was able to afford his living expenses, and have excess spending money during tobacco season, when customers spent more money gambling. Tobacco season began in late July or early August. A great deal of money was made during this time because tobacco is one of North Carolina's biggest cash crops. The excess money Walls earned was typically spent drinking or gambling in the city. He gambled knowing he would lose more than he gained. As time progressed, rumors spread of Walls being a crooked gambler, and he steadily lost his customers until he could not afford to pay living expenses.

During the Federal Writers Project interview Walls said, "I now wish that I had found a job and gone to work when my mother died. But I had tasted easy money."

In the interview, he also said he began reading the Bible after realizing his own "worthlessness", saying he liked "to read about those men who went about the earth doing good."His date of death is unknown.

Social Issues

Picture of a man leaving a prostitute's house.

Children Born to Prostitutes

Children born in brothels are exposed to sexual interactions at a young age. As a result of their exposure to the daily coming-and-going of men, they often become part of the sex trade later in their lives. "The girls become prostitutes while the boys become pimps when they grow up." Additionally, they will likely face bullying in school as a result of their family background, making them more likely to skip or quit school. This can result in a lack of life options, which causes them to be trapped within the sex trade.

Children of prostitutes are likely to have emotional problems revolving around their connections to their parents. One study done found that 5 out of 6 prostitutes in the U.S. lose custody of their children. Furthermore, they "expressed having either no relationship or negative relationships with their children." This led to those women having a lack of control over their children's lives, meaning they could not prevent their children from entering the sex trade. These women were found to have been abandoned by their parents, and did the same thing to their children. As a result, their children offer from the same abandonment issues they faced growing up.

Children of prostitutes often have negative relationships or no relationship with their mothers. Studies have shown that parent attachment can be a predictor for motivations to gamble, especially for vulnerable adolescents.

"In adolescents and young people, it has been found that decreased parental attachment is related to increased levels of problem gambling (Magoon and Ingersoll 2006)."

An association has also been drawn between gambling issues and unhealthy coping. Furthermore, emotionally vulnerable gamblers have been found to have more severe gambling problems and be more resistant to treatment.

Coal miners gambling on a Saturday afternoon on the porch of a company store.

Brief History of Gambling in the U.S. (from the 1800s - early 1900s)

Gambling in the United States can be drawn back to basic dice games, poker, and other card games. Poker was one of the biggest drivers for the spread of gambling across the country. It is believed that the evolution of early poker variants in the 1800s began with French colonists and English speaking settlers. They evolved the game Poque into many of the poker variants we know today. By 1834, poker spread throughout the U.S., becoming "a favourite pastime during the US Civil War."

Because of social concerns being raised around gambling, most forms of gambling were outlawed in 1910. Bingo in certain churches, as well as state-sponsored lotteries, were some exceptions. As a result, "poker, casino play and sports betting were driven underground and became a source of illegal revenue."

In the 1930s, many states "legalized horse racing and charitable gambling." In 1931, in an effort to recover from the Great Depression, Nevada made casino gambling legal again.

Compulsive Gambling and Financial Insecurity

In a Chicago Tribune editorial about gambling in the city, a writer said:

"Every one understands its horrid effects; none better than the victims to it. Yet, when it takes possession of the mind, it makes man a mad man — cursing him with an agony which no language can describe. The law seems powerless against it."

A gambling addiction can result from attempts to make a large sum of money when a person feels they are in "financial ruin" or because of a craving for the "emotional high" associated with gambling. Many gamblers seek to increase positive emotions through gambling. Gambling addictions can cause emotional symptoms such as depression. Furthermore, "losing everything to gambling" can create feelings of hopelessness. Studies support this, saying financial insecurity has been shown to undermine a person's perception of meaning in life. Additionally, many gamblers abuse alcohol or drugs to cope with stress from gambling.

References

• Abetya, Andrew A; Routledge, Clay; Kersten, Michael; Cox, Cathy R. The existential cost of economic insecurity: Threatened financial security undercuts meaning. The Journal of Social Psychology 157, no.6 (January 2017): 692-702, https://doi.org/10.1080/00224545.2016.1270892
• American Addiction Centers. “PsychGuides.” https://www.psychguides.com/behavioral-disorders/gambling-addiction/symptoms-and-effects/
• Benzkofer, Stephan. "Dev-Lin illegal gambling house flourished in 1930s just outside Chicago". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved 2021-03-29.
• Eby, Lillian T; Mitchell, Melissa E; Gray, Cavan J; Provolt, Laura; Lorys, Anna; Fortune, Erica; Goodie, Adam S. Gambling–related problems across life domains: an exploratory study of non-treatment-seeking weekly gamblers. Community, Work & Family 19, no. 5 (December 2016): 604-620, Academic Search Premier.
• "Farm and Factory Struggles. "NCpedia." www.ncpedia.org.
• Federal Writers Project Papers. Coll. 03709. The Southern Historical Collection at the Louis Round Wilson Special Collections Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
• Hena John-Fisk. Uncovering The Realities Of Prostitutes and Their Children in a Cross National Comparative Study Between India and The U.S. A dissertation submitted to the faculty of The University of Utah in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (August 2013): 147-148. https://collections.lib.utah.edu/dl_files/50/d1/50d1e65b59733d00504f99e7d989f8938765cffb.pdf
• Jauregui, P., Estevez, A. Predictive Role of Attachment, Coping, and Emotion Regulation in Gambling Motives of Adolescents and Young People. Journal of Gambling Studies 36 (December 2020): 1283-1300, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10899-019-09893-6
• Rana, Kriti. “Why We Should Do More To Help The Children Born To Prostitutes.” ED Times. (September 2017). https://edtimes.in/why-we-should-do-more-to-help-the-children-born-to-prostitutes/
• "Tobacco Harvesting: Lesson Guides: Teacher Resources: Special Collections Research Center: NCSU Libraries". www.lib.ncsu.edu. 2012-06-05.