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Bluffing in Style: Exquisite President Truman Poker Table Replica Featured in Charity Auction
- Updated: June 2, 2016
The poker table is the cardsharp’s workplace, arena, and funhouse all rolled into one. Green or red, oval or circular, poker tables range from luxurious pieces of art to workmanlike fold-out tables to simply get the job done. But the table built by friends and Iowa natives Jim Gocke and Dave Knau is special, a work of amazing craftsmanship that would be difficult for most to reproduce. Three years ago, these skilled men combined a love of history, woodworking, and poker to reproduce exact replicas of former President Harry Truman’s famed poker table.
The Truman table is unique to American history, and Gocke and Knau certainly know their way around a wood shop. The first table was built for Knau’s home poker room, and the second was presented to the U.S.S. Iowa in 2013. The ship is famous for being the “Ship of the Presidents” and is moored in San Pedro, Calif. The two table reproductions are gems of construction and the men’s passion shows in their precision and skill — and the word soon spread about their presidential poker work.
The Truman Little White House (Truman’s presidential library and retreat in Key West, Fla.) soon approached Gocke and Knau about building another replica. The retreat houses the former president’s original table, which was in need of restoration. Gocke and Knau delivered the replacement replica in December, but the woodworking bug continued.
“While building the table for the Truman Little White House, I asked Dave to help me build another table to donate to the Blue Ribbon Foundation Corn Dog Kickoff auction,” said Jim. “That has been completed and is awaiting the event in July. At the present time, there is no plan to build or donate any other true replicas of the Truman table. People who wish to purchase a very unique piece of poker furniture with a historical story will have this opportunity in July and possible another at some future date if and when the Truman Little White house decides to auction their table.”
The Truman table will be auctioned off by the Iowa State Fair Blue Ribbon Foundation on July 9. The nonprofit organization raises money for fairground renovations. Gocke has been heavily involved with the group as a volunteer for 15 years and saw the auction of the Truman table as a chance to help fund one of the most popular state fairs in the country.
Gocke and Knau on the U.S.S. IowaHistory and High Stakes
The U.S. presidency has seen its share of poker comparisons through the years. The Oval Office has also had its fair share of poker players — and Harry Truman may have been one of the most well-known. After being inaugurated, Truman ordered chips emblazoned with the presidential seal. With $500 buy-in games a regular at the White House and on presidential outings that involved journalists and members of his administration, certainly poker proved a bit of a getaway for the President in the throes of World War II. After picking up the game back home on the farm in Missouri in the 1890s, he continued the pursuit while serving in the army during World War I.
The game stuck with him for life.
“Truman’s preference for poker over fussy or Country Club pastimes helps explain the temperament of ‘Give ‘Em Hell, Harry’ during American labor disputes, hot wars with Japan and North Korea, and the cold war with Russia and China,” wrote author James McManus in his seminal book on poker history, Cowboys Full:The History of Poker.
The original table was a gift to Truman in 1949 by three civilian contractors working in the U.S. Naval Station cabinet shop. The table is a marvel of craftsmanship and one of the most popular pieces at the Key West presidential retreat. Measuring 58 inches in diameter and 28 inches high, according to Little White …
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