Ken Uston was one of the most famous Blackjack players to ever play the game. Uston led a very intriguing life. He attended Yale University as a teenager and earned a B.A. in Economics. In 1959, Uston completed his MBA in Finance from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Education, and went on to become the Senior Vice President of the Pacific Stock Exchange.

Big Player In the 1970s, Uston fell in love with blackjack, and he left the Pacific Sotck Exchange to play the game full-time. Uston was introduced to the game by Al Francesco, a professional gambler that he met in a poker game. Francesco taught Uston the basics of card-counting, and Uston was eventually recruited by Francesco to be part of his "big player" team of card counters. Uston wrote about the group"s gambling exploits in "The Big Player", a book that he co-authored with Roger Rapoport.

Although Uston"s gambling success with Francesco"s group was reported to be modest, Uston soon formed additional card-counting teams that enjoyed unprecedented success in casinos all over the world.

Legal Challenges Uston"s crew did a number on Atlantic City in the latter half of the 1970s, and the group"s members were soon banned from numerous casinos in the city. Uston fought his casino banishment through the legal system. He sued Resorts International for barring him, stating that he was a skilled player who wasn"t cheating. Some casino observers have claimed that Uston"s legal challenges actually made Blackjack success harder to come by. Players skilled at card counting faced new counter measures from the casinos including multiple decks, changing shuffling practices and adding new rules to the game.

Uston continued to play blackjack in casinos. Toward the end of his Blackjack career, Uston battled the casinos on his own, and he would frequently disguise his appearance so that he wouldn"t be booted from the tables.

Uston wrote countless Blackjack strategy books including "Million Dollar Blackjack" and "Ken Uston on Blackjack." Uston was also a big fan of computers and video games. He used to hide small computing devices in his shoe so that he could calculate statistical probabilities more quickly. Uston wrote books on home computers, and he even penned a best-selling strategy guide for beating Pac Man. In his latter years, Uston helped the Kuwaiti government develop software that would follow the progress of their diverse portfolio of global investment.

Uston was an extremely intelligent man. For bettor or worse, he shared the insights of skilled blackjack players with the general public. He was a father, a master of disguise, a world-renowned Blackjack player and an accomplished jazz pianist. In 1987, Ken Uston passed away in his Paris apartment.