The history of poker is open to debate, the game is said to have possibly desended from a number of other games including, the English game brag, the French game Brelan, and the Persian game of As Nas. It's possible that Persian sailors taught it to New Orleans settlers and was spread on the Mississipi riverboats where gambling was common. During the gold rush it spread along the Mississipi and at some point after 1829 where it featured 20 cards, it took on the full English 52 card deck we see today, aswell as seeing the flush introduced. The game is said to have been further spread across American and other parts of the world by the US military.