» Where Appeared Keno Game

The game of keno, which has the features of Bingo and any lottery, is nowadays popular all over the world. Keno was introduced in China by its head of state more than 2000 years ago. But the appearance of keno is wrapped in a mystery. Several different versions exist.
According to one assumption the game was invented during a war in China in order to supply the army with money. The citizens refused to contribute additional funds to the fruitless cause of the war. So the emperor tried to work out a strategy of generating the necessary finances. Cheung found an excellent solution to this problem: he created a very popular game - keno. The game was a success and it is cited as a major reason for the victory of Cheung's forces. It also contributed resources to 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.
The keno board didn't always look the same way. The Chinese classic characters were used instead of numbers. 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. Though the game was considered illegal, the new Chinese immigrants still played it. 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.