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Bluffing Texas Style: The Arsons, Forgeries, and High-Stakes Poker Capers of Rare Book Dealer Johnny Jenkins
In 1989 a woman fishing in Texas on a quiet stretch of the Colorado River snagged a body. Her “catch” was the corpse of Johnny Jenkins, shot in the head. His death was as dramatic as the rare book dealer’s life, which read, as the Austin American-Statesman declared, “like a bestseller.”
In 1975 Jenkins had staged the largest rare book coup of the twentieth century—the purchase, for more than two million dollars, of the legendary Eberstadt inventory of rare Americana, a feat noted in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. His undercover work for the FBI, recovering rare books stolen by mafia figures, had also earned him headlines coast to coast, as had his exploits as “Austin Squatty,” playing high stakes poker in Las Vegas. But beneath such public triumphs lay darker secrets.
At the time of his death, Jenkins was about to be indicted by the ATF for the arson of his rare books, warehouse, and offices. Another investigation implicated Jenkins in forgeries of historical documents, including the Texas Declaration of Independence. Rumors of million-dollar gambling debts at mob-connected casinos circulated, along with the rumblings of irate mafia figures he’d fingered and eccentric Texas collectors he’d cheated. Had he been murdered? Or was his death a suicide, staged to look like a murder?
How Jenkins, a onetime president of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America, came to such an unseemly end is one of the mysteries Michael Vinson pursues in this spirited account of a tragic American life. Entrepreneur, con man, connoisseur, forger, and self-made hero, Jenkins was a Texan who knew how to bluff but not when to fold.
250 pages, Paperback
First published March 26, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
June 16, 2020
"He's a sneaky, clever rat, and that's not a put-down; John Jenkins is as fine a man as ever put gun-powder on a safe."
- Amarillo Slim, quoted in Bluffing Texas Style, Michael Vinson
I'll disclose at the beginning that I'm friends with Michael. Last time we met was for dinner with my family and Michael while he was in NYC for the 60th Annual New York International Antiquarian Book Fair and we were there trying to grab a vacation (our trip to Spain had just been cancelled) before Coronavirus hit hard (we seemed to surf that last week of normal in NYC in early March 2020).
As much as I like Michael, this is not the type of book I'd normally seek-out, read or review. I do love collecting books, but my most expensive/rare book is probably worth less than $1500. I purchased a copy of Bluffing Texas Style because that's what you do for friends, you buy their damn books. I also thought I'd get around to reading it sometime in 2020 or 2021, but after seeing the book get attention in the WSJ I'd speed it up my queue.
First, the book is well-researched. The last 44 pages of this small book are notes, interviews, and bibliography. It also comes with the author's background in rare books and archives. I can only imagine how difficult it is to draw a picture of a linear historical figure but writing about one who is a fabulist and forge adds additional complexity to the task of trying to capture Johnny Jenkins.
I remember first reading about Jenkins in Calvin Trillin's piece in the New Yorker once when I was spending an extended amount of time in an Army Hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. I'd totally forgotten about that connection till I was about 1/2 way through this book. Vinson also does a great job of capturing the energy of the Texas rare books and documents market (and the many colorful idioms of Texas). Texas appears an almost perfect setting for rare documents (like California for grapes). It is a state with tremendous pride in its history and people, combined with a significant number of wealthy, competitive men (and women) interested in owning a rare part of Texas.
I wondered why? Why would what normally would be considered a fairly regional character and story would find its way into the New Yorker in the late 80s? Why would Vinson's book (from an Oklahoma Press) about a forger who died 30+ years ago would be covered by WSJ? I think it goes to the root of what this book is REALLY about. Forgery is a type of fraud. Fraud isn't regional. Every industry has it. The financial world is full of con-men, men who make big bets, lose it all, bakers who cheat their buyers with wood pulp in their bread. There is always a temptation to cross ethical lines. We live in an age where big personalities and corruption seem to be headlines every day. Perhaps, this book resonates because Vinson, through Jenkins, pulls back the cover just a little bit on what makes a man (or women) dupe his friends, bet it all, bluff, and keep raising the stakes.
- Amarillo Slim, quoted in Bluffing Texas Style, Michael Vinson
I'll disclose at the beginning that I'm friends with Michael. Last time we met was for dinner with my family and Michael while he was in NYC for the 60th Annual New York International Antiquarian Book Fair and we were there trying to grab a vacation (our trip to Spain had just been cancelled) before Coronavirus hit hard (we seemed to surf that last week of normal in NYC in early March 2020).
As much as I like Michael, this is not the type of book I'd normally seek-out, read or review. I do love collecting books, but my most expensive/rare book is probably worth less than $1500. I purchased a copy of Bluffing Texas Style because that's what you do for friends, you buy their damn books. I also thought I'd get around to reading it sometime in 2020 or 2021, but after seeing the book get attention in the WSJ I'd speed it up my queue.
First, the book is well-researched. The last 44 pages of this small book are notes, interviews, and bibliography. It also comes with the author's background in rare books and archives. I can only imagine how difficult it is to draw a picture of a linear historical figure but writing about one who is a fabulist and forge adds additional complexity to the task of trying to capture Johnny Jenkins.
I remember first reading about Jenkins in Calvin Trillin's piece in the New Yorker once when I was spending an extended amount of time in an Army Hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. I'd totally forgotten about that connection till I was about 1/2 way through this book. Vinson also does a great job of capturing the energy of the Texas rare books and documents market (and the many colorful idioms of Texas). Texas appears an almost perfect setting for rare documents (like California for grapes). It is a state with tremendous pride in its history and people, combined with a significant number of wealthy, competitive men (and women) interested in owning a rare part of Texas.
I wondered why? Why would what normally would be considered a fairly regional character and story would find its way into the New Yorker in the late 80s? Why would Vinson's book (from an Oklahoma Press) about a forger who died 30+ years ago would be covered by WSJ? I think it goes to the root of what this book is REALLY about. Forgery is a type of fraud. Fraud isn't regional. Every industry has it. The financial world is full of con-men, men who make big bets, lose it all, bakers who cheat their buyers with wood pulp in their bread. There is always a temptation to cross ethical lines. We live in an age where big personalities and corruption seem to be headlines every day. Perhaps, this book resonates because Vinson, through Jenkins, pulls back the cover just a little bit on what makes a man (or women) dupe his friends, bet it all, bluff, and keep raising the stakes.
November 14, 2020
Things this book is: fun and alarming at the same time, part of a long tradition of memoirs following rare book librarians/booksellers through some of their greatest hits regardless of the occasionally ethically questionable practices from "back then", a good introduction to Texas booksellers and other big Americana sellers in the second half of the 20th century, the occasional rare bookseller dry wit and "this is how it's done properly" commentary, decently short and to the point, a source of further readings similar to this one
Things this book isn't: particularly woke, a good source of information about the people who actually ran the rare books side of Jenkins' shop, a detailed study looking at quantitative considerations
Loved his first book and am happy to have read this one as well.
Things this book isn't: particularly woke, a good source of information about the people who actually ran the rare books side of Jenkins' shop, a detailed study looking at quantitative considerations
Loved his first book and am happy to have read this one as well.
February 17, 2022
You may notice that some reviews here say this book is well-written and others say it is not well-written. What gives? My opinion: this is a university press book. Although there is no ironclad law or constitutional amendment that says that university press books have to be a certain way, my experience is that university press books tend to adhere more closely to clearly provable or at least attributable facts, sometimes at the cost of reader-gripping narrative flow, than large-press non-fiction. Still, if you accept the fact that there will be no author-recreated dialog or statements of fact about things (like, what a person was thinking at a particular moment) that the author cannot be 99+% certain about, then this book is pretty easy reading, even if this book will never be mistaken for a best-selling novel.
Perhaps I am absurdly naive, but I was surprised to see the level of grifting, lying, cheating, etc., abroad in the world of fine book collecting. (I've already listened to two books about the same activity in the field of fine wine collecting, so I guess, yes, I am absurdly naive.) I mean, if someone attempts to make their crust by, for example, running a strip bar in which pathetic losers pay top dollar for bad-quality champagne while women pretend to be interested in them, then you might not be surprised if the man also does dishonest business with thieves, forgers, and drug addicts. However, I thought that rare book collecting might attract people of a more, well, cerebral character, or at least people who had more scruples about counterfeiting – and, even worse, defacing and destroying – historical books and documents.
Johnny Jenkins was a grifter from the get-go and, later, a compulsive gambler. The beginning of his career was in a more trusting age so he was able to walk out of archives and libraries with original documents to sell. At the end of his career, he might have been able to save – or at least salvage – his Austin, Texas, -based business if he had paid some more attention to it, but instead he was off in Nevada participating in poker contests. He was moderately successful at poker but, in the end, not successful enough.
The author is a rare-book dealer himself and was apparently a friend of Jenkins. Apparently the author, and many others who knew Jenkins, found him charming and his able to weave tall self-aggrandizing tales engaging, but exposure to the man over several hundred pages tends to be a bit wearying.
If this were a more honest age, perhaps grifting would be more fascinating. In this age, there's so much obvious public grifting going on that there is nothing duller than encountering a grifter in mid-grift. Still, it was interesting to have the curtain drawn back to reveal the world of high-end book collecting which, like the markets of many other high-end commodities, is much sleazier than its mahogany-lined exterior tends to let on.
This book was a Christmas present from the Long-Suffering Wife.
Perhaps I am absurdly naive, but I was surprised to see the level of grifting, lying, cheating, etc., abroad in the world of fine book collecting. (I've already listened to two books about the same activity in the field of fine wine collecting, so I guess, yes, I am absurdly naive.) I mean, if someone attempts to make their crust by, for example, running a strip bar in which pathetic losers pay top dollar for bad-quality champagne while women pretend to be interested in them, then you might not be surprised if the man also does dishonest business with thieves, forgers, and drug addicts. However, I thought that rare book collecting might attract people of a more, well, cerebral character, or at least people who had more scruples about counterfeiting – and, even worse, defacing and destroying – historical books and documents.
Johnny Jenkins was a grifter from the get-go and, later, a compulsive gambler. The beginning of his career was in a more trusting age so he was able to walk out of archives and libraries with original documents to sell. At the end of his career, he might have been able to save – or at least salvage – his Austin, Texas, -based business if he had paid some more attention to it, but instead he was off in Nevada participating in poker contests. He was moderately successful at poker but, in the end, not successful enough.
The author is a rare-book dealer himself and was apparently a friend of Jenkins. Apparently the author, and many others who knew Jenkins, found him charming and his able to weave tall self-aggrandizing tales engaging, but exposure to the man over several hundred pages tends to be a bit wearying.
If this were a more honest age, perhaps grifting would be more fascinating. In this age, there's so much obvious public grifting going on that there is nothing duller than encountering a grifter in mid-grift. Still, it was interesting to have the curtain drawn back to reveal the world of high-end book collecting which, like the markets of many other high-end commodities, is much sleazier than its mahogany-lined exterior tends to let on.
This book was a Christmas present from the Long-Suffering Wife.
May 25, 2025
Years ago I picked this book up from a little free library. At the time I had no knowledge or interest in the world of rare books, but I grabbed it because I have always had an interest in stories about fraud. Flash forward, and I’ve rather unexpected found myself getting a Masters of Library Science and working in a rare book library, and with my new knowledge, it felt like an appropriate time to finally give this a read.
Based off of my own experiences and stories from my supervisor, most rare book dealers and private collectors are at least a little bit insane, so a lot of the wild stories in this book track. I do agree with the other reviews that by university press standards, the story is very engaging, but definitely not as entertaining as the standard mass-market nonfiction publication. It’s got some clunky sentences that I had to re-read multiple times to actually understand, and a large cast of characters who are easy to loose track of as they come in and out of convoluted stories about finances and frauds.
Also, as someone with no knowledge of poker, I found my eyes glazing over in the more poker-heavy chapters, and I can see the same happening for folks without pre-existing rare book knowledge for much of the other chapters. It can be a neurotic field, and while I found the sections on forgery identification through close analysis of individual printed letters on a broadside to be fascinating, I can see others viewing them as boring and myopic in a story that opens with as juicy a hook as Jenkins being found shot dead in a river.
Overall, I enjoyed it. I found it to be a quick read, but I am also a nerd about this kind of stuff + haven’t read a book with a clear linear narrative like this in so long I can’t even remember, so take my thoughts with a grain of salt.
Based off of my own experiences and stories from my supervisor, most rare book dealers and private collectors are at least a little bit insane, so a lot of the wild stories in this book track. I do agree with the other reviews that by university press standards, the story is very engaging, but definitely not as entertaining as the standard mass-market nonfiction publication. It’s got some clunky sentences that I had to re-read multiple times to actually understand, and a large cast of characters who are easy to loose track of as they come in and out of convoluted stories about finances and frauds.
Also, as someone with no knowledge of poker, I found my eyes glazing over in the more poker-heavy chapters, and I can see the same happening for folks without pre-existing rare book knowledge for much of the other chapters. It can be a neurotic field, and while I found the sections on forgery identification through close analysis of individual printed letters on a broadside to be fascinating, I can see others viewing them as boring and myopic in a story that opens with as juicy a hook as Jenkins being found shot dead in a river.
Overall, I enjoyed it. I found it to be a quick read, but I am also a nerd about this kind of stuff + haven’t read a book with a clear linear narrative like this in so long I can’t even remember, so take my thoughts with a grain of salt.
August 30, 2020
I am a rare book librarian, and I found this a fascinating account of Johnny Jenkins, about whom I had heard rumors and a few stories from members of the generation right before me. The book is meticulously researched and well written- the author has clearly dug deep into archives, spoken to contemporaries, and even collected his own materials about this colorful character. He's right that this story has a strong Texas flavor, in which a good old boy with some brains and a charismatic personality was able to bluff his way into million dollar deals and garner international publicity while pulling off schemes on anyone who wasn't paying close enough attention. I learned quite a bit that is helpful to my trade about older forgery techniques as well as the back stories of a number of important book dealers (Wm. Reese and H.P. Kraus), institutions (like the Harry Ransom Center at UT-Austin), and Texas printing history. There are also stories about a number of wealthy oil men who took up collecting Texana who were often a little too trusting of Jenkins. But the whole thing is very well-documented, so I don't feel that it is mere gossip. Recommended for those in the field, and those interested in recent and distant Texas history.
November 19, 2021
The Wall Street Journal had a glowing review of Bluffing Texas Style. I put it on my reading list and bought a copy from Barnes and Noble when my family gave me a gift card. Perhaps my expectations were a bit too high.
Bluffing is nonfiction that reads like fiction. Johnny Jenkins was a Texas rare-book-and-document seller who dabbled in forgeries. He cultivated many high-profile customers, including a governor. He was also a wannabe card shark who participated in the World Series of Power. In 1989, Jenkins died under mysterious circumstances as his life unraveled. The portrait of Jenkins that emerges is that of larger-than-life character, an adrenaline junky who was always looking for his next thrill.
The story seems to be a can’t miss. While Bluffing Texas Style is pretty good, I felt it should have been even better. One problem is that author Michael Vinson goes far too deeply into the minutiae of the rare-book business. Some of that material is quite dull. Also, Vinson seems to have had no interviews with Jenkins’ widow or his children, so large pieces of Johnny Jenkins’ life are missing.
So, I enjoyed this book, but don’t think that it’s a “must read.”
Bluffing is nonfiction that reads like fiction. Johnny Jenkins was a Texas rare-book-and-document seller who dabbled in forgeries. He cultivated many high-profile customers, including a governor. He was also a wannabe card shark who participated in the World Series of Power. In 1989, Jenkins died under mysterious circumstances as his life unraveled. The portrait of Jenkins that emerges is that of larger-than-life character, an adrenaline junky who was always looking for his next thrill.
The story seems to be a can’t miss. While Bluffing Texas Style is pretty good, I felt it should have been even better. One problem is that author Michael Vinson goes far too deeply into the minutiae of the rare-book business. Some of that material is quite dull. Also, Vinson seems to have had no interviews with Jenkins’ widow or his children, so large pieces of Johnny Jenkins’ life are missing.
So, I enjoyed this book, but don’t think that it’s a “must read.”
April 2, 2020
Vinson gives us a glimpse into one of the most infamous rare book dealers of the 20th century: John Holmes Jenkins. Through interviews with people that knew him best, and available archival resources, the reader is entertained and enlightened about Jenkins, the golden age of Texana, and some of the stories from the rare book world of the 20th century.
Those stories and interviews make this book really stand out. Mr. Bryan, Dr. Tyler, Mr. MacDonnell, and Mr. Reese knew Jenkins well and were generous with their time and stories: giving us a glimpse into the most Texas of booksellers: Jenkins.
Heartily recommended for those interested in Texas history, rare books, and the book trade generally.
Those stories and interviews make this book really stand out. Mr. Bryan, Dr. Tyler, Mr. MacDonnell, and Mr. Reese knew Jenkins well and were generous with their time and stories: giving us a glimpse into the most Texas of booksellers: Jenkins.
Heartily recommended for those interested in Texas history, rare books, and the book trade generally.
January 25, 2021
This is a fun book about an intriguing character. The author has great passion for the subject of his work which carries the reader along. And there are so many great stories the author has put together. For the most part the author is able to tell a complicated story without the reader getting lost in the weeds. I must say that at times I thought that there was more detail about rare books and poker tournaments than was needed. But that is a minor quibble.
I am struck by how long someone can get away with being a con person and how the person can get flattering profiles in newspapers and magazines and can get recognition from prestigious organizations.
Overall a fun book to read.
I am struck by how long someone can get away with being a con person and how the person can get flattering profiles in newspapers and magazines and can get recognition from prestigious organizations.
Overall a fun book to read.
May 5, 2020
What a fast read I experienced, a book on loan from my son the rare book dealer who knew a few of the characters in this real-life wild life that Johnny Jenkins constructed. I'd known a bit of this story decades ago, and knew a few of the California bookmen and their stories that are mentioned. I judge that Vinson has put together a fine true objective and comprehensive biography of this Texas wildcat. I'd have rated the book higher had there not been instances of mediocre writing, poor editing or proofreading, more clear photographs, and at times I'd welcome more detail. However, those points do not diminish the pace of this writing of a life wild, unethical, and indeed bluffing his way to his self-inflicted death in a small stream in rural central Texas.
Goodread starts out the student with this summation of the plot. - "At the time of his death, Jenkins was about to be indicted by the ATF for the arson of his rare books, warehouse, and offices. Another investigation implicated Jenkins in forgeries of historical documents, including the Texas Declaration of Independence. Rumors of million-dollar gambling debts at mob-connected casinos circulated, along with the rumblings of irate mafia figures he’d fingered and eccentric Texas collectors he’d cheated. Had he been murdered? Or was his death a suicide, staged to look like a murder?
"How Jenkins, a onetime president of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America, came to such an unseemly end is one of the mysteries Michael Vinson pursues in this spirited account of a tragic American life. Entrepreneur, con man, connoisseur, forger, and self-made hero, Jenkins was a Texan who knew how to bluff but not when to fold."
Goodread starts out the student with this summation of the plot. - "At the time of his death, Jenkins was about to be indicted by the ATF for the arson of his rare books, warehouse, and offices. Another investigation implicated Jenkins in forgeries of historical documents, including the Texas Declaration of Independence. Rumors of million-dollar gambling debts at mob-connected casinos circulated, along with the rumblings of irate mafia figures he’d fingered and eccentric Texas collectors he’d cheated. Had he been murdered? Or was his death a suicide, staged to look like a murder?
"How Jenkins, a onetime president of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America, came to such an unseemly end is one of the mysteries Michael Vinson pursues in this spirited account of a tragic American life. Entrepreneur, con man, connoisseur, forger, and self-made hero, Jenkins was a Texan who knew how to bluff but not when to fold."
June 23, 2020
Interesting story of notorious Texas rare book dealer, poker player and criminal.
February 5, 2021
Fascinating story, very well-written. A rare book about a very rare, rare book dealer.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews