You chose wisely! Here it is folks, the Holy Grail of Erdnases. The first edition. Self published by the author in 1902. The typical going rate for this edition is anywhere from $1000-3000 depending on condition. Richard Hatch estimates that perhaps 100 or so exist in the world, and he's managed to track down and locate about 70 of them. If you know of one, please let Richard know. This particular copy once belonged to Jack Avis and is in very nice shape. It is now in the collection of Jason England.

One of several hardback Drakes produced from about 1905 to 1915 or so. This copy is from the collection of Jason England.

Another of the Drake hardbacks, this one resides in the collection of Richard Hatch. It is thought that although they don't command the same prices as the first edition, some of these Drake hardbacks are actually less common.

This copy is described as being extremely rare in the Jeff Busby book The Man Who Was Erdnase. The book claims that only one was known to exist. That claim is no longer true, as a few more have surfaced since Busby's book was written.

Here's an example of a Drake softbound edition with the indices on the King of Hearts. Frost, KC Card Company, and Powner all used this basic cover for their editions.

This early Drake softbound edition has what is obviously a King of Hearts on the cover, but without the Heart indices. Later Drake editions added the indices. With the exception of the indices, this basic look remained essentially unchanged by several future publishers of The Expert at the Card Table, including Frost, KC Card Company, and Powner.

A rare copy of the Fleming HB with a different dust-jacket. This copy came with a sheet of blue paper that appears to be another dust-jacket at first glance. This copy is from the collection of Jason England.

A fairly common HB edition of Erdnase. This is one of the earliest editions of Expert to have a dust jacket. It is also the first edition to include Professor Hoffman's comments to Erdnase.

According to Busby, this book was never actually produced. Customers who ordered this book from KC Card Company are said to have received a normal copy of The Expert At the Card Table. Obviously Busby should have dug a little deeper. Several copies of this title have surfaced in recent years.

A fairly inexpensive, but nice copy of Expert.

There have been at least two versions of a comb-bound GBC reprint of Expert. Both contain 205 pages, but they are of different sizes and have different covers. The older version uses the standard King of Hearts cover, and the newer one uses the Bee back design cover.

This cover of this edition clearly shows a well-dressed Erdnase carefully watching his opponent complete a cut. It's the only photograph we have of Erdnase at the card table. Okay, so maybe that's not him. But hey, anyone who plays cards in a suit and tie is pretty cool.

An excellent overall edition of Expert, this version features what is obviously a Bee back design pattern on the front and rear covers.

Not much is known about this edition. Michael Canick was involved in the advertising and selling of this version of Erdnase for the 100 year anniversary, but he denied any involvement in the actual production of the book. It is a near-perfect copy of the true first edition. The only difference is the word "Facsimile" on the inside. It sells for (appropriately enough) $52 per copy.

A nice edition of Expert by Casino Press. It's interesting to note that the publisher chose to use Bee cards for the cover. The final diagram in the book clearly shows an Ace of Spades from a Bee deck. We wonder if the publisher was aware of this or just happened to choose Bee cards? In any case, they used bridge-sized cards, which no self-respecting cardman would be caught dead with.

When Dover reprinted Expert in the mid-90s, they decided for some reason to re-typeset the book. This resulted in many of the page numbers being off. For instance, in the true first edition, the bottom deal begins on page 52. In the Dover edition, it begins on page 53. For those of us trying to memorize the damn thing, this creates a bit of a problem. We recommend you get a first edition.

This is a specialty binding, probably done as part of a library or someone's collection. It is the only one we've seen like this, and it looks very nice, but the truth is it isn't worth very much.

A very nice looking softcopy of Erdnase. It is interesting to note that the orange cover is actually a dustjacket. The perfect-bound book inside is made of a more natural looking paper. We hope to have a translator look at the book and give us some more details on it.

Christian Scherer translated this compact little hard cover version of Erdnase from English to German in 1991. It doesn't include a translation of Professor Hoffman's comments, but appears to include the complete original text. There is a minor mistake on the spine of the book. Under the dust jacket is the name E.S. Erdnase, instead of S.W. Erdnase or E.S. Andrews.

Another nice softback translation of Expert. Although I don't speak Spanish, I think the inside cover says it was translated by Monica Tamariz.

This is the first of two French editions. It was apparently translated by Richard Vollmer. Although only 171 pages long, it contains the entire (translated) text of the original 205 page English edition. Roberto Giobbi wrote the introduction.

This is the second of two French editions. It appears identical in every way to the first French edition, with the exception of the green cover.

The page numbers are listed as 186, but the translated text doesn't begin until p. 19. There are also a few pages of notes at the end of the book. Roberto Giobbi wrote an introduction of sorts, as did Steve Forte.

This is Michael MacDougall's Card Mastery, which contained the complete text of Expert. There are no annotations like in The Annotated Erdnase or Revelations, unless you consider MacDougall's 81 pages of preceeding text annotations. We don't. This particular softback copy was signed by MacDougall to a gentleman named "Steady Cash."

This is the first of two excellent annotations of Expert. The other is Darwin Ortiz's The Annotated Erdnase. This copy contains Dai Vernon's thoughts about the book that he nearly singlehandedly popularized in the first half of the 20th century. There are many rumors and stories about how Ricky Jay, Persi Diaconis, and Steve Freeman conspired to keep out the "good stuff." There is no hard evidence however.

This is Darwin Ortiz's excellent annotation of Expert. There are dozens upon dozens of notes, annotations, and photographs of various things all related in some way to gambling, cheating, or Erdnase. The book includes hundreds of citations and references to other books and authors, and contains two appendices, one on "New Moves" and the other on "The Search For Erdnase" by Martin Gardner. Several letters from Martin Gardner to M.D. Smith are reproduced as well. There are rumors that the book was going to be even larger, but Pat Cook, Andrew Wimhurst, and David Roth conspired to keep out the "good stuff." There is no hard evidence however.