The next effort of great influence on the blackjack math was made in 1956 by the group of four mathematicians- Roger Baldwin, Wilbert E. Cantey, Herbert Maisel and James McDermott.

These people had never played in casino before, having spent a great number of m/hr, they created basic strategy of playing blackjack according to the most popular at that time rules and published it together with the calculation methods in the specialized math journal for statisticians - Journal of the American Statistical Association entitled “The Optimum Strategy In Blackjack”.

They made several slight mistakes in calculations which is nothing serious taking into account their enormous contribution. A year later they issued a small book Playing Blackjack to Win, which is now a bibliography rarity.

In fact their book and the article did not spark much furor, and remained almost without attention regardless of their innovative approach. However, the word almost turned out to be the key for all the gambling industry, as someone did paid close attention to the research of the excellent four.