I've heard the scam story too, Doug Saito related it in a Chip Chat about a year ago. The story I heard here on the board about five years ago is a story I like a little better. I should have filed the post that gave a very simple and logical explaination of these chips and the ones with the black edges, but I was pretty new when it floated by and didn't keep it.

These kind of chips were given away on the street to entice folks to wander into the joints. The bus station in Reno was where a lot of Riverside Hotel FP chips got handed out. Bus traffic from the Bay area in particular was pretty hot in Reno. Las Vegas was a little different and these chips were given away at different locations around the Fremont St. area. As I recall the story, the poster had this info from an old timer who was working in the clubs at the time and his explaination was that the black edges simply denoted where the chips were handed out. The east parking lot would see black edged chips for instance. I suppose you could track different chip runner activity this way also and keep track of their activity and effectiveness.

Why do I like this explaination better than the black chip rack hustle? It's a lot simpler and more elegant story to my thinking. Geez, the fallout from fake black chips would be pretty grim and I've never heard of the LV Nevada Club in any of it's interations being a bustout joint. That's my thinking anyway, your milage may vary.

I think it's a interesting variation of the chip and some insight to downtown LV back in the day.