The Poker Hall of Fame has announced its 2008 induction Class, Duane “Dewey” Tomko, a three-time World Series of poker bracelet winner, a two-time Main Event runner-up, and the holder of the longest consecutive Main Event participation record (35 years) will become poker’s newest Hall of Fame member.

Tomko will enter alongside Henry Orenstein, a Holocaust survivor who won the 1996 World Series of Poker Seven-Card Stud Championship and also cashed twice in the Main Event, including a final table finish at the 1995 World Series of Poker Main Event. Orenstein perhaps is better known for his real occupation – an inventor – holding more than 100 patents, including those for Sesame Street toys, Snoopy toys, the Transformers and U.S. Patent 5,451,054, which gave Orenstein the exclusive right to detect and display hole cards in poker games. Of course, without that last invention, televised poker would not be nearly as popular or prevalent as it is now. Orenstein and Tomko will be enshrined on Sunday, November 9 at the Penn & Teller Theater at the Rio All-Suites Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas during the finale of the 2008 World Series of poker Main Event championship. ESPN will show portions of the ceremony during their November 11 telecast. The enshrinement and WSOP final table play are open and free to the public. Seating is available on a first come, first serve basis.

The Poker Hall of Fame, established in 1979, was acquired by Harrah’s Entertainment along with the World Series of Poker in 2004.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008 at 10:55 am and is filed under Gambling Fortunes, Games Playing, Have Fun. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.