Clock bag

A clock bag is a bag used in bookmaking with a lock and a built-in clock, intended to prevent fraud by proving the bets inside had been placed before a sporting event had started.{{cite book |last1=Huggins |first1=Mike |title=Horseracing and the British, 1919-39: Off-Course Betting, Bookmaking, and the British |date=2003 |publisher=Manchester University Press |location=Manchester |isbn=0719065283 |page=79}}{{cite book |last1=Dudgeon |first1=Piers |title=Our Liverpool: Memories of Life in Disappearing Britain |date=2012 |publisher=Headline |isbn=9780755364442}}{{cite news |last1=Wood |first1=Greg |last2=Paley |first2=Tony |title=Talking Horses |url=https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2012/jan/04/live-racing-january-4-2012 |access-date=2 August 2023 |work=The Guardian |date=4 January 2012 |quote=I know this book to be very readable because my brother bought it for my Dad for Christmas and he's already given me a lecture about what a clock bag is and how it worked.}} The bets, or "lines", inside would often be "rolled in bundles each marked by a pseudonym".{{cite journal |title=Criminal Law and Practice in Scotland: Betting - Cash or Credit? |journal=The Police Journal |date=1939 |volume=12 |issue=4 |pages=391{{endash}}399 |doi=10.1177/0032258X3901200402}}

Clock bags were in regular use in illegal gambling starting during the 1920s.{{cite book |last1=Clapson |first1=Mark |author-link1=Mark Clapson |title=A Bit of a Flutter: Popular Gambling and English Society, c. 1823-1961 |date=1992 |publisher=Manchester University Press |location=Manchester |isbn=0719034361}} In Glasgow during the 1930s, runners would collect bets in clock bags and then telephone bookmakers for the outcomes. This was a common practice called "shovel betting".

It has been speculated that clock bags may have originated around pigeon racing.