I’m reading Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody, and on page 221 it says this:
We walked over to one of the little broken-down tables and pulled up a couple of creates and started a game of Coon King as all th eteenagers stood around looking. … All that evening I sat playing Coon King and thinking…
I Googled it but couldn’t find it. What is Coon King?
Found this reference regarding “Rummy” card games.
Others connect the origins of Rummy games to early Spanish communities who moved over to the west. The Spanish card game of Conquian bares a striking resemblance to Gin Rummy and is sometimes considered to be an ancestor of all modern Rummy games. One theory was that Conquian (then known as “Coon Can”, “Coon-can”, “Coon-King” or “Conkin”) started in Spain hundreds of years ago and was later carried to Mexico before spreading to the American southwest in the late 19th century.
http://rummy.com/rummyhistory.html