The Devil's Tickets

by Gary M. Pomerantz

  Two men came to see Ely in the summer of 1929. They wanted to profit from the surging interest in contract bridge by publishing a correspondence course on the game. They needed a writer and couldn’t afford the sage royals Wilbur Whitehead or Milton Work, whose annual earnings from bridge lectures, writings, and teachings matched those of corporation executives. Publisher Lewis Copeland and Herbert DeBower, founder of the Alexander Hamilton Institute, came to Ely and Jo’s apartment on East Sixty-third Street to see if Ely might be their man. But they offered Ely only a few hundred dollars plus a nominal royalty.

  Sensing a bigger opportunity, Ely invited Copeland and DeBower to a follow-up lunch at the Ritz, where he dressed fashionably, laughed easily, smoked constantly, and, as was his custom, spoke to the waiters in French. Ely was selling himself with charm and élan. He impressed his listeners, who also came for dinner the following night at a summer home Ely and Jo had rented in Westhampton, not to be confused with the more glamorous hamlet that four years earlier had served as the basis for F. Scott Fitzgerald’s West Egg in The Great Gatsby. There, Jay Gatsby lives and throws his grand parties, fifty yards from the Long Island Sound, between big houses that rent for $12,000 to $15,000 a season. The house Ely and Jo rented was an architectural eyesore, eminently available, that featured an overgrown garden with stucco monsters and gargoyles sitting, standing, and straining to fly. The bootlegger Jay Gatsby wouldn’t have spent a minute in the place.

  After dinner, as Jo tended to the children, Ely got down to business. What he wanted, he said, was not a correspondence course deal. He wanted financial backing on a grand scale.

  He explained that interest in contract bridge was building across America and that, each day, thousands of players were leaving auction for contract. He wanted to ride the crest of this cultural wave. Women were the driving force, he said. Whereas hidebound men stuck with auction, women were more venturesome and open-minded toward the new game. But, Ely insisted, they were nonetheless coaxing and dragging their sneering, howling husbands to contract in unprecedented numbers. There was big money to be made.

  Ely believed the game needed a standardized system of bidding so that it could be learned quickly. He had collected a thousand bridge “test hands” that reflected the experience of millions of players, and had classified them by suit length, freakish or balanced distributions, and honor-trick strength. He had developed his Approach-Forcing system. At the moment, he said, there were too many books—Whitehead, Work, Reith, Vanderbilt, Lenz—promoting systems too complicated for everyday players. But if one man with a system easily understood by social players across America could break through this noise…

  Ely vowed to be that man.

  He would outwork, outthink, and out-advertise all the other experts. Now, for his two listeners, he laid out his plans to build a bridge empire. First, he and Jo would capture the American Bridge League championship and the prized Vanderbilt Cup, emblematic of national team-of-four supremacy. In so doing, he would build credibility for the Culbertson name. He would also create a nationwide network of instructors teaching the Culbertson System. His planned October launch of The Bridge World magazine would allow him to spread the Culbertson brand. With his trophies, monthly magazine, and network of teachers, his mastery of contract bridge would be inarguable. Then, and only then, would he write his bridge book. It would sell hundreds of thousands of copies, and he would leverage those sales in columns in newspapers and national magazines, on the lecture circuit, and on radio. He might even put his name on a brand of bridge supplies.

  Ely proposed the formation of a partnership: 51 percent for him and Jo, and 49 percent divided between Copeland and DeBower. This partnership would share in the revenues generated by a newly created “public idol”—a witty, charming man with the pedigreed manners of the royal court, a man whom millions of American housewives and bridge enthusiasts would admire as their teacher and mentor—the tuxedoed, spotlessly manicured Ely Culbertson.

  To the two men on the Culbertsons’ davenport that night, the question was not whether this idea was presumptuous or preposterous—it was both—but rather, was Ely Culbertson serious?

  As evidence of his sincerity, Ely produced a memorandum emphasizing the importance of publicity, propaganda, and advertising. Nations and churches had taken shape through the manipulation of the masses, he explained. He would do the same—first with women. He would make three basic appeals: to the ego, to fear, and to sex. He would show how, at the bridge table, women and men would be on an equal intellectual footing. He would use fear to suggest that women who did not play bridge would be left behind in their own communities, uninvited to luncheons, afternoon teas, and dinner parties. He would use the sex angle by promoting husband and wives playing as partners. He would heartily recommend bigger spats and arguments between husbands and wives at the bridge table as a way to defuse the petty inhibitions and tensions of daily married life.

  In projecting on the screen of the mass mind, he said he would fictionalize himself. Ely the Celebrity, an artificial creation, would be tough, cocky, comically conceited, sophisticated, if eccentric—very much like the man sitting before them now. He would project himself as flawed, because flaws made a man seem more authentic. He would glorify his brilliant coups at the bridge table but also publicize and magnify his mistakes, which would humanize him and double his publicity. His public character would be projected through newspapers, radio, motion pictures, and word of mouth. Ely said he understood the mass mind from having watched revolutionary crowds in Russia, and from studying the master orators who had held those crowds spellbound.

  Copeland and DeBower asked about the practical issues of his plan.

  Wait, Ely said, there was more.

  A second character would be required, he said. That would be Jo. Her character traits would also be fictionalized. More than merely the greatest woman bridge player, Jo would become, Ely said, my favorite partner. Yes, he said with cunning, women would love that: a husband who saw his wife as his intellectual equal, or his superior. Jo would be projected as calm, steady, a lover of peace, the perfect foil for Ely—and she would be pitched as a better bridge player than Ely, too. Ely and Josephine Culbertson would become the First Couple of American Bridge, a husband-and-wife team in complete harmony.

  No, gentlemen, Ely said, he would not write a bridge correspondence course. But when the moment was right—not now—he would write his bridge book. In fact, he would write several books. The first would be the Contract Bridge Blue Book, a title with an impressive official sound. (And a familiar sound, though Ely’s listeners no doubt were unaware that in 1906, still the age of bridge-whist, Paul F. Mottelay had written The Bridge Blue Book.) This book, Ely said, would be followed by the Red Book and the Gold Book. Then he would produce summary handbooks for each that could be carried easily in a woman’s purse or a gentleman’s pocket. (The idea of pocket books for games was a familiar one, too: in 1802, an adaptation of Hoyle appeared under the title The New Pocket Hoyle, and was frequently reprinted.) In these six books, Ely would strategize on bidding and play.

  In a nation of 120 million, there were perhaps only 20 public idols. Ely admitted that no one had heard of the Culbertsons. But soon, if all went according to plan, the Culbertson name would be on the lips of millions of bridge lovers.

  The two men asked Ely how much money he needed.

  Ely said he would need to rent an office for his magazine. There was also his teachers’ organization, and the need to promote his personal appearances.

  Fifty thousand dollars, he said.

  Silence filled the room.

  Or, Ely said, $25,000.

  Silence.

  Or perhaps $15,000. His inevitable success, he said, would simply take longer to materialize.

  DeBower and Copeland wished him well and left to find another bridge writer on the cheap. They laughed at him then, but less than three years later, Ely and Jo Culbertson were mil
lionaires, the First Family of a full-blown American bridge craze, and it had happened nearly as Ely had plotted it.

  Late in September 1929, Ely was a bridge magazine editor at long last. The Bridge World, his creation, would list on its masthead a business department, an editorial department, a circulation department, an executive office, and the headquarters of the Culbertson National Bridge Studios. This sounded impressive, except all of it was crammed into a dingy three-room office with tattered furnishings at 45 West Forty-fifth Street. The “staff” amounted to two frazzled young women unsure if their next paycheck was coming. Ely played the Knickerbocker and other clubs on weekends, and when his winnings surged his magazine staff got paid, sometimes with raises. When the cards did not fall, no one got paid.

  In a stroke of fortunate timing, The Auction Bridge Magazine founded by Work and Whitehead fell into bankruptcy earlier that month, clearing the field for The Bridge World. Ely would claim a first printing of twenty thousand, though more likely it was considerably less than that. He dedicated his magazine to the elites and near elites, “a relatively small community of Bridge players equal to a fair sized city,” a readership that would influence the social bridge masses. His first issue, nearly completed, spread across forty-eight pages and was every bit as elegant as its editor, especially the cover, with a medallion that bore an eighteenth-century male image and the name of Edmond Hoyle (though no true portrait of Hoyle was known to exist). Inside, above the table of contents, the masthead read, “THE BRIDGE WORLD, Ely Culbertson, Editor.” Articles by Lenz and Whitehead (a reprint, “Reading Concealed Hands”) helped establish the magazine’s credibility. There was a cartoon by H. T. Webster of The New York World, a diagrammed Bridge Hand of the Month, reviews of the latest books, and a column titled “Pro Et Contra,” ostensibly edited by Jo. There was a full-page sketch of Jo, looking askance, above the fray, and quoted as saying, “Contract today is in swaddling clothes.” There was the gratuitous condolence extended to the defunct Auction Bridge Magazine, and Ely’s even more gratuitous rave of Harold Vanderbilt’s new book for its “vigorous thinking of a high intellectual order.” (Ely craved the support of Vanderbilt, who had conceived the modern game.) The Bridge World masthead listed foreign editors, A. E. Manning-Foster, in London; Pierre Bellanger, in Paris; and Guido Branca, in Rome; plus eleven contributing editors, including Jo, Lenz, Whitehead, Lightner, and the Baron von Zedtwitz. Bridge teacher Madeleine Kerwin lit a fire with a controversial article about the arrogance of men who refused to accord some women their rightful position among elites. “From the heights of his masculine egotism the average man Bridge player refers with a pitying smile to ‘women players’ and ‘women’s afternoon Bridge game,’” Kerwin wrote. “Any woman teacher knows of the difficulties in giving instruction to men. They cannot submit to a woman’s judgment and they will obstinately persist in a bad system of bidding, or in out-of-date leads even when paying for correction.… Intelligent women players accept constructive criticism and are pathetically eager to perfect their game. They do not attempt to dominate every situation and they consider their partner’s judgment both in bidding and play.”

  That fall, the New York Whist Club won the Vanderbilt Cup for Teams-of-Four, with Ely and Jo (plus Lightner and von Zedtwitz) finishing a disappointing third. A week later at the American Bridge League championships at the Drake Hotel in Chicago, Ely and P. Hal Sims won the Men’s Auction Pair title, while Jo and Olga Hilliard partnered to win the women’s competition. Some of the elites did not show at Chicago, though. Sidney Lenz, feeling the ill effects of arthritis, remained at home. Whitey was detained in Manhattan on business. Milton Work didn’t attend, either. Then again, Work rarely risked his whist reputation in bridge tournaments. In Chicago, Ely’s contract team-of-four again failed to win, though he took solace in the increased press coverage of the ABL event. The Hearst Newspaper Syndicate sponsored a radio broadcast of one contract hand between the winners and runners-up in the team-of-four competition: the Knickerbocker Whist Club (Sims, Liggett, Reith, and Derrick Wernher) versus the Chicago Auction Bridge Club.

  His tournament victories would come (and soon), and The Bridge World would record every aspect of Culbertson’s genius. In his inaugural issue, Ely emphasized that his magazine would work only for the greater good of contract bridge:

  THE BRIDGE WORLD will fill, we confidently believe, an important place in the American home. As the only magazine devoted to Bridge, the favorite intellectual recreation of the majority in all walks of life, it will afford a medium for the exchange of free thought on subjects of common interest to Bridge players, and a place where the news of the Bridge world and its fascinating doings has been especially gathered for the information of the lover of the game.

  As is well known, the Editor of THE BRIDGE WORLD has certain well defined views on questions of bidding and play. This does not mean that those holding opposite views will be excluded from the presentation of them in the magazine.

  Quite the contrary is true. It is in the crucible of conflict that truth is proven.

  He knew how to manipulate people, ideas, and situations. From the beginning, Jo had it right. Ely played people better than cards. It was an unteachable skill shaped either by a sixth sense or a gambler’s instincts. He could change his personality to fit the setting. At home, he treated Jo in much the way Jack treated Myrtle, as a utilitarian accessory who, characteristic of the age, was expected to sublimate her own desires to those of her husband. Dark, truculent, and imperious at the office, where he drove his workers as hard as he drove himself, Ely walked into a lecture hall and became, suddenly, incandescent. In lectures he was witty, urbane, and considerate, a personality unrecognizable to his magazine staffers. How he transformed himself in this way they did not know. But it worked so well they wondered: Who is he, really?

  Like his magazine, Ely was colorful, gossipy, and intellectual. He mocked other bridge experts, even some who served as his contributing editors. He built his reputation in part by tearing down the reputations of others. He barely hid his self-promotion. In a single forty-eight-page issue of The Bridge World, the self-absorbed Culbertson had his name appear 164 times.

  No bridge development or anecdote went unnoticed by the new editor. In New York, a doctor sued for separation from his wife, charging she had violently slapped him during a bridge game. “Marion, behave yourself,” the doctor said after being slapped, and the game, though strained, continued. In December 1928, a similar story out of Chicago had hit the national wires: Mrs. Ruth Kelso Wood had doubled a four-diamond bid. When her opponent took ten tricks and fulfilled his contract, Mrs. Wood’s husband, Gerald, playing as her partner, erupted in a rage. He struck her in the face. A few months later it happened again, this time in a progressive bridge game, with rotating partners, the Woods suddenly a partnership again: Mrs. Wood trumped her husband’s ace, a fumble on her part, but Gerald Wood didn’t wait for her explanation. He stood and, in a familiar rage, struck her in the face. The couple separated, and then, after a cooling-off period, reconciled. They agreed never to play again as bridge partners, until, at a friend’s home, the host pulled out a bridge table. Partners again, the Woods saw a new disaster bring the same result: He struck her again. Mrs. Wood sued for a divorce, which was granted by Judge William N. Gemmill. The judge, a bridge player himself, seemed confused as to why the wife had trumped her husband’s ace. “How did you come to do that?” the judge asked. Her attorney interceded: “Your honor, it is permissible to trump an ace.” From the bench, the judge nodded, and said, “More married couples should hear your story. If husbands and wives didn’t play partners in bridge maybe there would be fewer failures in matrimonial partnerships. I’m hearing too much lately about spouses who failed to recognize an indicative bid.”

  Most readers undoubtedly laughed. Not Ely. Marital spats at the bridge table gave life to his sales pitch. They dramatized the game, carried it from the sepia-tone age of auction into the louder,
more sensational modern age. These marital spats made real the battle of the sexes. They made headlines. They got people talking. And Ely would use them to his advantage.

  FOUR

  Four Spades She Bid

  I