Back in the dark ages of the latter half of the last century, apart from at the track the only place you could legally get a bet on the horses, dogs or trots was at the government-run Totaliser Agency Board which was in every suburb and every hotel in NSW. 

But after the government took its slice the TAB odds weren’t always the best. And so, illegal starting price bookies, who gave better prices and offered credit to their punters, sprang up all over Sydney much the same as the speak-easy bars sprung up everywhere during Prohibition throughout the 1920s and 30s in America.