» Keno Why Appeared

One of the most popular games at any casino is Keno. It is a game similar to the big state or provincial lotteries. Keno was introduced in China by its head of state more than 2000 years ago. Still the origins of the game are really a bit of a mystery. There can be found several different opinions.
The most commonly taken opinion is that Cheung Leung invented this game when his army ran out of money during some war. The city residents didn't want to give their money to support the unworthy aim of the emperor. Cheung had nothing else to do but to develop some new way of taking money out of the people. After some considerations he created the game of keno, which immediately got very popular and thus profitable for the state. Keno helped Cheung win that war. It is also credited for providing resources and helping to fund the massive undertaking of building the Great Wall! Keno was later given a different name - the White Pigeon game. That was not for nothing: carrier pigeons informed the surrounding towns and villages of the winning numbers.
In the past rather than having a board of just numbers on the original keno boards, they used classic Chinese characters. The total of 120 characters was used in the game but the number reduced to 80 in the long run.
Keno appeared in the US in the 19th century as a lot of Chinese people came there to work on the railroads. The fact that gambling games were forbidden didn't prevent the Chinese from playing and spreading it all over the States. It continued to use Chinese characters and thus obviously didn't enter popular mainstream American culture until it was modified to include the numerical system.