U.S. [? f. BUCKET sb.1 + SHOP.]
(The Leeds Mercury of Dec. ’86 says—“The market authority in Chicago, called the Board of Trade, would not allow a deal in ‘options’ of less than 5,000 bushels of grain. In order to catch men of small means, what was called the ‘Open Board of Trade’ … commenced business in an alley under the regular Board of Trade Rooms. There was an elevator to carry the members of the board to their rooms, and occasionally a member, if trade was slack, would call out, ‘I’ll send down and get a bucketful pretty soon,’ referring to the speculators in the ‘Open Board of Trade’ below. Hence the term ‘bucket shop’ came to be applied to all grain gambling institutions.”)
An unauthorized office used originally for smaller gambling transactions in grain, and subsequently extended to offices for other descriptions of gambling and betting on the markets, the stocks, etc.
1882. Standard, 28 Dec., 6/5. A system of speculation carried on in grain in what are termed bucket-shops.
1886. Statist, 28 Aug., 234. The ‘bucket shop’ is an American institution … and it was first used for retail gambling in grain. Ibid., 235. Men opened offices and started a business in Stocks which was simply betting…. The ‘bucket shop’ keeper … offered to deal at close prices and without commission…. There are ‘bucket shops’ and ‘bucket shops.’ The worst class of them are thimble and pea sharpers under a more polite name.
1886. Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 11 Nov., 2/2. A new plan to suppress bucket-shops and restore speculative trading to former channels.
