Snagging a critical G-59, B-15, O-71, or some other bingo number could potentially pay off in a big way for players at Connecticut’s Foxwoods Casino.
The property is celebrating 40 years of offering high-stakes bingo with a session of “Firecracker Bingo” on July 4. The event features more than $1 million in cash and prizes. That includes a $440,000 single cash jackpot and an attempt at a Guinness World Record for a bingo game’s largest payout.
Before becoming a full-fledged casino, Foxwoods began as a high-stakes bingo hall in 1986, owned and operated by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation. The property now hopes to build on that history with a world-record effort.
“The Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation saw an opportunity to build something meaningful for future generations, and bingo became the catalyst for that vision,” tribal Chairman Rodney A. Butler told the Hartford Courant.
“The impact extends far beyond the game itself. This anniversary is an opportunity to honor the determination, leadership, and community that helped shape the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation’s success story and create lasting opportunities for our people.”
Bingo Bonanza
In the late-20th Century and into the 2000s, high-stakes bingo became popular on tribal lands. The industry was the precursor to the major resort casinos operated by many Native American tribes.
According to David Schwatrz’s history book on gambling, “Roll the Bones,” the Penobscot Indians of Maine and the Seminoles of Florida were the first tribes to begin offering bingo in the 1970s. Connecticut and Oklahoma followed suit in the 1980s. The Foxwoods went on to open a full-scale casino in 1992
“What the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation built 40 years ago wasn’t just a bingo hall; it was a blueprint,” Foxwoods President and CEO Jason Guyot said.
“That vision and courage to invest in something that had never been done at that scale on tribal land is the reason Foxwoods exists today. Attempting to set a Guinness world-records title on the same anniversary feels like the right way to honor that legacy, a milestone worthy of the one that started it all.”
The casino still operates one of the largest bingo halls in the US, with more than 2,000 seats. An official Guinness representative will be on hand Saturday to certify if the attempt at a record is successful.
Foxwoods Poker History
Along with bingo, Foxwoods has a deep history in poker. The company opened the original room in 1995, and during the Moneymaker/online boom of the 2000s, the casino in southeastern Connecticut was one of the meccas of U.S. poker.
The property was a mainstay on the World Poker Tour, hosting the World Poker Finals through 2011. Foxwoods was also home to World Series of Poker Circuit events as well. The room became one of the biggest in the country in 2006 after expanding from 76 tables to 114.
The size of the room decreased over the years, but the property unveiled a new 33-table venue in September with expanded hours and newer technology.
In other Connecticut poker news, lawmakers introduced legislation for the state to join the country’s shared liquidity and player pool agreement last year.
