RIP Ralph Greenleaf

Ralph Greenleaf died on this day, March 15, in 1950. Greenleaf was the greatest straight-pool player of the 1920s and ‘30s and one of the greatest pool players of all time. His beautiful wife, Amelia Ruth Parker, was a half-British, half-Chinese (and thoroughly American) vaudeville star known as Princess Nai Tai Tai, "The Oriental Nightingale." They toured the Orpheum circuit and even performed under giant mirrors at the Palace Theater, Greenleaf in an immaculate black tuxedo doing trickshots, and Nai (nay), as she was known, emceeing in a white silk cheongsam. Together, they were one of the most dazzling couples of that dazzling era. Greenleaf made as much money as Babe Ruth, and was one of the first sports superstars (along with Babe Ruth, Bill Tilden, and Ben Hogan). But Greenleaf was also tragic character--a chronic alcoholic--and though Nai fought his alcoholism (sometimes literally: she smashed an ashtray on his head at the 1933 World Pocket Billiard Championship), he eventually drank himself to death. Nai had Ralph's body sent by train to his hometown of Monmouth, Illinois (she rode beside the casket the entire way), and she buried him with his Rambow cue in one hand and an ivory cue ball in the other. When Nai died, a quarter century later, she was buried next to him.

Thanks, Lenny.

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