Where do flop, turn, river come from?

[ZeroGee]

I'm always talking about poker at a friend's cube, and his cubemate today asked, "Where do the names flop, turn, river come from?" I couldn't find the answer through some googling -- anyone know?

Thanks,
ZG

[Zele]

The only one I think I know is "river". The most plausible explanation I heard is that it comes from stud games where the last card is dealt face down. Newbies forgot this and dealt the card faceup sometimes, so the mnemonic "down the river" was invented.

On another note, the word "turn" used to refer to what we know as the flop.

[onegymrat]

Hi ZeroGee,

We had the same conversation over a friendly home game and this was how I explained it. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Flop: The "flopping" of three cards up, rather than down.

Turn: Your hand has just "turned" into crap.

River: You will now cry a "river" since your top pair just got chased down by an inside straight.

Hey, this works for me!

[thirddan]

LOL, i like the turn explanation...

[youtalkfunny]

Here's what I heard--who knows if it's true???

The old riverboat cheats used to get a sucker to push all his chips in, then the cheat would catch the miracle card on the end. In those days, cheaters got tossed off the boat if they got caught (just like in that movie "Maverick"). So that last card became known as the river card.

Can't help with the other terms.

[Cosimo]

huh, so "river" as the last card comes from "rivered", what happens when you get sucked out on--rather than the reverse. Chances are there were three or four good explanations, and the fact that it was popular in one place allowed it to spread to others. Where'd it come from first? I like the riverboat explanation, since that ties in well with Poker's early history.

I didn't think that Hold'em was that old, however. "River" is used in stud, but what about Flop and Turn?