billiardhistory
Billiard History Buff
Folks,
I posted this on the Main Forum before I realized there was a forum dedicated to Billiard and Pool History, which would have been more appropriate for the subject.
Anyway, I basically wanted to let people who might be interested know that there is a new memorial website dedicated to The Snap Magazine. If you're not familiar with The Snap, it was one of the most popular billiard magazines back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and is desribed in various venues as "the best of all pool publications," and as being "among the best billiard publications ever."
The Snap was known for its humorous and frank, no-holds-barred editorial tone, often publishing articles that did not sanitize or gloss over things like hustling, gambling and other topics most billiard publications of the day shied away from. The Hustler column alone was often worth the price of the magazine, since it profiled many well known billiard stars, telling honest stories about their early backgrounds as road men. With columnists, instruction writers and contributors like Benny "The Goose" Conway, Buddy Hall, Grady Mathews, Johnny Archer, Mike Massey, Ray Martin, David Howard, and many others, various issues of The Snap now read like a virtual history of the sport.
Anyone interested in billiard history should find the site worth at least a few minutes of their time. It contains articles on the magazine's history and other aspects of its development and lifespan, plus a section showcasing each individual issue, with stories about how they were conceived and put together, plus scanned graphics of the covers (with enlargements if you click on the cover), of the tables of contents, and of a selection of articles.
Because getting hold of Snap back issues is a rather expensive proposition today (many sell for up to $150 each, and a complete set might run you $1500 or more), those who do not own copies can learn a lot about the magazine and its history by visiting this website. If anyone is interesed, the site is located at:
http://www.thesnapmagazine.com/
There is also a Wikipedia page about The Snap at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Snap_Magazine