I thought that some California card room chip collectors and historians would find this interesting.

In 1984, the California legislature passed the Gaming Registration Act which - for the first time - required all California card rooms to register with the state.

That initial list of all registered card rooms was published in a California card room guidebook later that year. I’ve included the first several pages of that list in this post. If you would like the full 25 page list, feel free to email me.

In 1997, the Gaming Control Act was passed, which for the first time required all California card rooms to be licensed not only by their city (or county), but also by the state. This law caused a major card room apocalypse in California, and when the law became effective on January 1st, 1999, only about 150 licensed card rooms remained.