The operation was illegal, but operators chartered their club under the AMVETS ruse.
Bob Hooks, 80, is a lifelong poker player who opened the AMVETS Post No. In the 1960s, gamblers traveled the state seeking out action. The club boasted some of poker’s biggest players, many who went on to win World Series of Poker accolades. Twenty-five years ago, 1921 ½ Greenville housed the AMVETS Club, a card house that hid behind the name of a charity serving American veterans. But the red steel door, complete with security camera and door buzzer, are remnants of an old poker club that ran games from 1969 until the mid-1980s. Today the two-story, red brick building houses Elan Make Up Studio and The Girl’s Room, an aerobics studio.
