Matthew Schafer, age 13, of Meridian, Miss., for his question:
WHEN WAS THE FIRST LOTTERY HELD?
A lottery is the distribution of prizes, usually money, as determined by lot or chance, to the winning purchasers of lottery tickets. Lotteries are considered a form of gambling because the value of the prize is greater than the cost of the ticket and no skill is
involved in winning. Lotteries are of ancient origin. They were used in the entertainments of the Roman emperors and later of the feudal princes of Europe.
The first state lottery was held in 1520 in France, where lotteries became an important source of royal revenue. In Italy, lotteries became popular after 1530 when the city of Florence held one offering money prizes.
The lottery was introduced in England in 1569 under the patronage of Queen Elizabeth I. In the American colonies lotteries were authorized by the colonial legislatures to raise funds for such public purposes as the paving of streets, the construction of wharves and the erection of churches.
Lotteries to finance buildings for Yale and Harvard colleges were held in 1750 and 1772, respectively. In 1777, the Continental Congress attempted to raise funds by lottery for the revolutionary army.
Lotteries suffered a decline in the 19th century. In the U.S. growing opposition, particularly among the churches, led to legislation in 1833 prohibiting lotteries in New York and Massachusetts, and during the next two decades, in most of the other states.
The first legalized lottery to be held in the U.S. in the 20th century was the state lottery initiated by New Hampshire in 1963. New York State initiated a lottery in 1967, with profits from the sale of chances going to help support public education.
Today a number of different states are using lotteries to raise money.
A popular fund raising activity of churches, fraternal organizations and social clubs is the type of lottery known as a raffle. Another widely played form of lottery is the numbers game, which is illegally operated in some U.S. urban centers by organized syndicates.
To divert funds from this illegal operation and channel this revenue into the state treasury, New Jersey in 1975 instituted the first state run numbers game in the U.S. using mechanical devices to select the winning combinations. A number of other states have since followed suit.
During World War I1 the Soviet Union promoted the sale of bonds by giving away a lottery ticket with each bond purchase.
Perhaps the most popular of all lotteries of this century has been the Irish Hospitals' Sweepstakes, established in 1930. Four of these lotteries are held annually, each based on the outcome of a separate horse race, one of which is the Irish Sweeps.