Q:

Some years back, I remember a cocktail waitress at the MGM in Reno (now the Grand Sierra Resort) refusing to serve beer to a couple of guys. She explained to them that it's 18 to gamble, but 21 to drink. Does my memory serve me well? If so, when did the age to gamble change? Thanks in advance.

A:

It hasn’t changed, not for 81 years and your waitress was quite misinformed. Jeff Burbank literally wrote the book on gambling regulation in Nevada, a history of the state’s Gaming Control Board and Gaming Commission entitled License to Steal. He provides this timeline, "Nevada permitted gambling for people 17 and older in 1869. Then the state raised it to 21 years in 1875. Gambling was basically banned statewide in 1909. When casino gaming was approved by Nevada in March 1931, the legislation set the legal age to gamble at 21" again.

The dean of active Nevada historians, UNLV’s Prof. Eugene Moehring, further elaborates. When the legal gambling age was first codified, in 1869, "there were certainly big young men (today, they'd probably be playing high school or college football) who were under 21 and owned mining claims," having left home early, "who could gamble. They definitely were allowed to vote in mining districts (although not after the district became a town), could drink, and undoubtedly could gamble around the campfire and in Virginia City's casinos … as long the guys had gold or gold dust to wager."

Over a century later, Nevada’s state budget relies preponderantly upon gambling revenue. Thus, when the Great Recession began to take hold in mid-November 2008, the Gaming Control Board – acting upon the advice of attorney Thomas Smock – proposed lowering the legal gambling age to 18. However, the prospect of balancing the state’s books out of the wallets of teenage gamblers looked too opportunistic and was much too badly timed to succeed. Two Las Vegas Democrats, then-Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley and state Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford wasted no time in shooting the idea down. It has not been resurrected since.

Maine used to have the lowest casino-gambling age (16), as of June 2000, but that has since been raised to 21. States where you can gamble at 18 include Idaho, Montana, Pennsylvania, Rhodes Island and West Virginia. In states with tribal casinos, it can vary from 18 to 21, depending on the tribe. Each has its own, discrete gaming commission and sets rules accordingly.