Some of my old pictures

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SilverCue

Sir Raksalot
Silver Member
I'll add a few now and then.

A young man came into the pool room where I was working and ask where he could find a money game. I didn't know him from Adam, He was wearing a nice gray suite.
I mentioned 1/2 dozen or more places where I played. Little did I know he had been to all of them.
Then I ask him what he did for a living. He said he sold game supplies like darts etc.
So I ask if he also sold billiard supplies. He replied that he did.
I was about to suggest we play a few cheap games when my boss entered.
My boss ask him who he was and he said that he was Minnesota Fats but he'd been sick. My boss thought that was funny and handed me 10 20s and told me to play him.
We played 9 ball for 20 a rack and it took him 16 racks to take it all.
Then he wanted to play 14.1 to 100 for the time and he would spot me 50.
I got free time, so I said OK. Also, my high run back then was 75.

He broke and I made 3.
He started to run and when he got to 50, I ask him who he really was.
When he told me he was Nick Varner and he was in town to give an exhibition at the Junior College. Then he continued he run to 100.
He invited me to the exhibition where we did some simultaneously shots. Then he said for his next trick, he would run 100 balls.
Now that table had a strong roll off and you couldn't shoot soft.
He ran 100 1st try :)

This is from Nick Varner before he turned pro.
 

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Thomas McKane

Thomas McKane

Lifelong student of one p
Silver Member
SilverCue said:
I'll add a few now and then.

A young man came into the pool room where I was working and ask where he could find a money game. I didn't know him from Adam, He was wearing a nice gray suite.
I mentioned 1/2 dozen or more places where I played. Little did I know he had been to all of them.
Then I ask him what he did for a living. He said he sold game supplies like darts etc.
So I ask if he also sold billiard supplies. He replied that he did.
I was about to suggest we play a few cheap games when my boss entered.
My boss ask him who he was and he said that he was Minnesota Fats but he'd been sick. My boss thought that was funny and handed me 5 20s and told me to play him.
We played 9 ball for 20 a rack and it took him 16 racks to take it all.
Then he wanted to play 14.1 to 100 for the time and he would spot me 50.
I got free time, so I said OK. Also, my high run back then was 75.

He broke and I made 3.
He started to run and when he got to 50, I ask him who he really was.
When he told me he was Nick Varner and he was in town to give an exhibition at the Junior College. Then he continued he run to 100.
He invited me to the exhibition where we did some simultaneously shots. Then he said for his next trick, he would run 100 balls.
Now that table had a strong roll off and you couldn't shoot soft.
He ran 100 1st try :)

This is from Nick Varner before he turned pro.
Click to expand...

Awesome experience.
 
macguy

macguy

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
SilverCue said:
I'll add a few now and then.

A young man came into the pool room where I was working and ask where he could find a money game. I didn't know him from Adam, He was wearing a nice gray suite.
I mentioned 1/2 dozen or more places where I played. Little did I know he had been to all of them.
Then I ask him what he did for a living. He said he sold game supplies like darts etc.
So I ask if he also sold billiard supplies. He replied that he did.
I was about to suggest we play a few cheap games when my boss entered.
My boss ask him who he was and he said that he was Minnesota Fats but he'd been sick. My boss thought that was funny and handed me 5 20s and told me to play him.
We played 9 ball for 20 a rack and it took him 16 racks to take it all.
Then he wanted to play 14.1 to 100 for the time and he would spot me 50.
I got free time, so I said OK. Also, my high run back then was 75.

He broke and I made 3.
He started to run and when he got to 50, I ask him who he really was.
When he told me he was Nick Varner and he was in town to give an exhibition at the Junior College. Then he continued he run to 100.
He invited me to the exhibition where we did some simultaneously shots. Then he said for his next trick, he would run 100 balls.
Now that table had a strong roll off and you couldn't shoot soft.
He ran 100 1st try :)

This is from Nick Varner before he turned pro.
Click to expand...

I saw him do a few of those collage exhibitions. He was really good and he did always play some straight pool and run balls. Most guys just do the tricks and bail out of the place .

I remember years ago reading an interview with Lassiter asking why he almost never did exhibitions. He said all they want is trick shots, no one has the time to watch you run a 100 balls.

In retrospect, I had seen Lassiter play maybe 50 times and don't ever remember seeing him shoot a trick shot, not even in the practice room when everybody was just fooling around..
 
Cuebuddy

Cuebuddy

Mini cues
Silver Member
Great story and cool picture! Thanks for showing it off.
I was able to meet Nick last year in Denver and I'm here to tell you Nick still has game.
He knocked off some of the country's top young guns and came close to winning the tourney.
One of my all time favorite players. :cool:
 
book collector

book collector

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Nick is the epitome of a lion in a lambs suit.
Always a perfect gentleman when I have been around.
 
Vahmurka

Vahmurka

...and I get all da rolls
Silver Member
now, for Nick Varner and hundreds and tables I have a story from a man who later learnt a lot from The Colonel.

He told me, they were to arrange an exhibition or a tournament, I don't remember, so they had a table set up. And Nick was there, they asked him to check whether the table was true and so on. Varner got his cue, broke a rack of straight pool - and proceeded to run a 100! Then he unscrewed and said "The table is fine" :D


Silver, I sent you a rep note (click User CP in the menu above to read it)
 
G

garczar

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Check out the JOSS box-cue in his mitts. Could have been made before Bill&Dan split. Maybe not. Awesome cue. Buddy of mine has a Tulsa time-period JW that's very similar.
 
P

pdcue

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
garczar said:
Check out the JOSS box-cue in his mitts. Could have been made before Bill&Dan split. Maybe not. Awesome cue. Buddy of mine has a Tulsa time-period JW that's very similar.
Click to expand...

The pic is post-graduation but pre-perm, prolly mid-to-late 70s.
Well after the Joss split.

Somewhere I have a brochure of Bill's circa '77(-ish) and the picture post card
from 1973 or 4. A cue very similar to the one pictured was a whopping $650.
Tho the cue Bill played with at Dayton tourneys in the mid 70s was Ebony with ivory 'boxes'

By the late 70s, just to set the stage, a tip replacement with a
Champion< the Mori/Kamui/tip d'jour> of its day was FIVE dollars.
An ivory ferrule replacement, was $12.

The box cue was $900-ish as best I recall.

Dale
 
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Gunn_Slinger

Gunn_Slinger

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
The cue Nick is holding is one of 3 made by Joss. One made for him, one made for Charlie Duvalier ( Weenie Beenie's partner in the famous pool room in arlington va )
And one for an old friend of mine "Penny".
There are many pics of Charlie's cue in the hands of Bennie ( one is in the book ' winning one pocket' ).
All the cues were made the same except the butts below the wrap were different.
Nicks did get sold in japan.
Charlie's got busted over a pool table at Beenies ( not by him...lol ).
And Penny retired his after having Bob Frey make him an exact opposite of the cue.
'White became black, black became white'.
Penny's cue was made in 1970, dont know about the others, although I thought they were made together.
Billy and Danny would know.
Many think the cues were all ivory...they wern't. Its an implex shell over wood inlaid with ivory.
An all ivory cue would be very very heavy!
.
 
S

SilverCue

Sir Raksalot
Silver Member
Not an old picture :)

28-29 March, I played in the 25th Anniversary Maryland Moose tournament.
On Sunday, this young lady came in and signed my cue and posed for this shot.
Over my left shoulder, you can see the tip of my pool cue.
69" 24.998 oz :) It's leaning against the wall or it would be taller than her.
 

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terryhanna

terryhanna

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Nick was such a great player he played all games jam up sometimes it seems his name gets skipped over sometimes when the greatest players of all time come up

He beat Efren is his prime in the Philippines – Manila Race to 60 and it was not even close look at this crowd you see any Varner fans lol

Nick Varner & Efren Reyes lagging for the break in a race to 60....JPG
 
R

RADAR

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
NICK VARNER IN MY OPINION IS THE GREATEST ALL AROUND LIVING POOL PLAYER LIVING. YEP OVER EFREN,SIGEL,REMPE,HALL YOU NAME THEM! HAS MY VOTE! HE HAS WON WORLD TITLES IN ALL DISCIPLINES, A FANTASTIC MONEY PLAYER. OH HOW CAN 1 FORGET A TREMENDOUS 14.1 PLAYER. :thumbup:
 
3andstop

3andstop

Focus
Silver Member
RADAR said:
NICK VARNER IN MY OPINION IS THE GREATEST ALL AROUND LIVING POOL PLAYER LIVING. YEP OVER EFREN,SIGEL,REMPE,HALL YOU NAME THEM! HAS MY VOTE! HE HAS WON WORLD TITLES IN ALL DISCIPLINES, A FANTASTIC MONEY PLAYER. OH HOW CAN 1 FORGET A TREMENDOUS 14.1 PLAYER. :thumbup:
Click to expand...


I think I know a greater living pool player ... but he's dead. :thumbup:
 
jay helfert

jay helfert

Shoot Pool, not people
Gold Member
Silver Member
I've known Nick from the get-go, when he was a college kid following Hubert Cokes around at Johnston City. Old man Cokes loved to sneak him in on the unsuspecting. Thanks to his dad, Nick learned how to gamble at an early age. Between his father and Cokes, Nick got some pretty high level mentoring, by two of the best.

Nick had trouble winning on the pro tour when he first got out of college, but persevered and became a champion player in the era of Mizerak, Sigel, Hall, Hopkins and Rempe. Believe me it was not easy to win a 9-Ball tournament back then with all these killers and many more just like them (Try Earl, Efren, Parica, Wade Crane, Jimmy Reid, David Howard, Jimmy Marino, Ray Martin, Jim Mataya, Jay Swanson, Jimmy Fusco and Keith McCready on for size).

Nick had one year where he won eleven major 9-Ball tournaments, all of them with full fields of champions. No one else among all the above great players ever had a year like that. Nick had more heart per square inch than any other pool player I ever met.
 
S

SilverCue

Sir Raksalot
Silver Member
A couple years after moved to Maryland, they opened a new pool hall in Waldorf (closed less than a year later) and held a professional pool tournament for the grand opening.
On the 1st day, before the tournament started, Mike Segal was taking on all amateurs in nine ball, one game each with amateur racking and breaking.
I had my son with me and he played 1st and got a signed picture.
When it was my turn, I broke and ran out but got no picture. :)
 

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macguy

macguy

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
SilverCue said:
A couple years after moved to Maryland, they opened a new pool hall in Waldorf (closed less than a year later) and held a professional pool tournament for the grand opening.
On the 1st day, before the tournament started, Mike Segal was taking on all amateurs in nine ball, one game each with amateur racking and breaking.
I had my son with me and he played 1st and got a signed picture.
When it was my turn, I broke and ran out but got no picture. :)
Click to expand...
wow, that was almost 30 years ago. Does your son still play?
 
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