Pool Halls v. Home Tables: Where Do Pool Players Come From?

Biloxi Boy said:

Where do pool players "come from"?
I know that we played anywhere, any chance we got, but where did we really learn the game?

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Therein lies a huge problem.

Biloxi Boy said:

Where do pool players "come from"?
I know that we played anywhere, any chance we got, but where did we really learn the game?

Click to expand...

I came from Lithuania. The Russian Jewish community in the USSR was famous for pool players, so when I was 8 my parents moved to the US to help my career. I fooled them by not playing till I was 16 and never becoming good enough to make any money at it. I bet it's the last time those suckers move to another country for me. There is a picture of me in every Synagogue in the country that states "don't let this man in unless he can run 3 racks on the spot, he dishonored our legacy".

When I was fifteen I bought a pool table and put it in our "living room". No big deal since family life took place in a den that had been added on next to the kitchen. The living room had two doorways going into it from each end of the hall so the living room and the hallway paralleled each other. The bathroom was at the opposite end of the house from the den. I made myself a rule that I had to run at least a rack of balls coming or going past the pool table, no using the hallway. Aside from the hours of regular play, I ran many a quick rack just to pass by the table. I also put in countless hours at an old pool hall. Never gambled at home or the hall that was my home base, maybe for a beer at the hall. I saved real gambling matches for down the road. I figured I couldn't work on my game at the hall if somebody was always trying to match up, gambling there would be pooping in my own nest.

The combination of the home table and playing everywhere that had a pool table was hard to beat to round out my shooting skills. From Tee Neg's on the world's longest street, to the Gold Nugget and Moonlight Inn on the eastern border of the Heart of Acadiana, Cajun country was my area to "work" and play in. A bit of trivia, The Moonlight Inn was The Boar's Nest for a week or two when they were shooting the newer version of The Dukes of Hazard. As soon as the movie crew moved out the old sign went back up, decades of tradition trumped fame.

I came from "all of the above." The home table, bars and pool halls all over Cajun country where the pretty Cajun girls made things interesting for a young man. The oil patch was booming and the living was easy! Luckily I had moved forward in my day job when the bottom fell out. I counted burned commercial buildings riding down a highway in the oil patch during the downturn. One in three commercial buildings had burned on that highway!

Hu

Pool Rooms are where players come from. We need more Pool Rooms.

I started on a friend's uncle's attic table. Started going to some local rooms in high-school then took it up seriously in 1st yr of college. Have played a ton in bars but have always preferred a good old-school 'hall. My area, Tulsa-Ok., used to be a hot-bed of pool but its all but dead here. Very few younger players anymore. Video games, phones and just general laziness has killed it around here.

Biloxi Boy said:

Where do pool players "come from"?
I know that we played anywhere, any chance we got, but where did we really learn the game? pool players may have had home tables as kids, but they really learned the game playing in pool halls, observing and playing against the best players.

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Biloxi Boy said:

Where do pool players "come from"?
I know that we played anywhere, any chance we got, but where did we really learn the game?

Click to expand...

Are you referring to pro level players or any pool players? Some pro level players may have had home tables growing up as kids, but they Learned the game playing in Poolrooms, observing and playing against the top players there.

Once they became the best player in that room, then they had to take their skills to other pool rooms/tournaments/road trips, to continue to improve their skills. Otherwise, they stagnated at that level and never got any better, which is the case for a number of players that never took that next step to try to advance their game to higher levels.

I started playing on a home table at age 10 in the earl 60s. Graduated to pool room play by age 16, bars by 18. You really don't learn how to play in front of people- in competition- until you actually put yourself in that position continuously - in terms of being a competitive player/gambler/ or tournament player. When you get down on the balls where it really means something for cash or status or a prize and in front of other people watching you/ evaluating you/ betting on you or the other guy- the game is vastly different than just playing by yourself at home or in a room.

Learning to play your best in public competitive situations sharpens one's focus , builds confidence, and strengthens the nerve. Some great practice players in every sport just could not perform well in competition. I've seen many guys look like champs warming up prior to a match- and fold like sheep once the battle began. Great experienced players put the pressure on immediately to test their competition to see if they can hang in the arena, and anytime the armor starts to show some cracks- they go for the kill- that is the competitive world.

Mike Zuglan, one of the best in the world - late 80s thru early 90s, even though he did not play much on the pro circuit back then,( he had a room in Rotterdam NY) ALWAYS SAID - practice is fine- but once you get to a certain level, you MUST play competitively at your highest possible level to stay sharp.

Pool halls.... Everyone I know that can play a lick started out in a pool hall. None of the top players in my area have even owned a pool table...lol. I have had one for years and only put it together because covid and my want to provide my kids an outlet during our lock down.

I say "pool hall" and not "room" because the later gives it a sense of class. There was no "class" in the establishments in my town. Pool halls were all looked down on, and honestly, rightly so. Some real scum in those places back in the day.

The_JV said:

Pool halls.... Everyone I know that can play a lick started out in a pool hall. None of the top players in my area have even owned a pool table...lol. I have had one for years and only put it together because covid and my want to provide my kids an outlet during our lock down.

I say "pool hall" and not "room" because the later gives it a sense of class. There was no "class" in the establishments in my town. Pool halls were all looked down on, and honestly, rightly so. Some real scum in those places back in the day.

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two trips to a pool hall.
first trip dad stayed with me to play pool
second trip my dad left and I didn't realize how long he was gone for

for me it was about the physics, back in the 90s early science education was binary or sound based.
by the time i finished high school I had figured out more from the pool table than the school books explained.

when i started attending leagues, tournaments and international events is when I started studying the billiard industry.
it was the source of many assignments while I was in school.

there was a barbox in the college basement. I did a few demonstrations.

Calling people with no guidance scummy is an insult. If all people had growing up was scum, they likely don't know how not to be scummy.

justnum said:

Calling people with no guidance scummy is an insult. If all people had growing up was scum, they likely don't know how not to be scummy.

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You have no clue what you're talking about. Were you there..? Did you know the people I'm referring to..? Do you know the environment and activities the owners were more than willing to allow within their businesses...? No of course you don't. However we all know you not having a single grain of knowledge on a topic won't prevent you from puking your two cents on to a thread. ...and to make it even more entertaining this particular topic is my opinion and choice of words.

Feel free to quote me and post more of your drivel in response. Personally I'm going to try out the new ignoring function.

If you are old enough to remember how you got "addicted' to the "atmosphere" of this game - especially back in the 60s and 70s pool halls- you will no doubt have etched in your memory some of the following: many rooms were located either up or down a staircase - you will still remember vividly that about the time you reached the mid level of that stairway- up or down- the sound of clicking pool balls let you know that you were just about to enter a sanctuary unsurpassed by anything imaginable at street level .

Secondly, as you took your first step into the room- there was always a certain smell ( all the elements of smoke, old carpeting, poor ventilation, etc.) combining towards an unmistakeable odor- the pool hall!

Third: always the front desk man, always the house table, always the cue locker, always the large front desk time stamp clock, seldom: food service, bar service, women, music.

Fourth, but maybe most memorable- the first time you walked up or down those stairs into the room with your very own cue and case- a sign that you had bought into the mystique! To me, it was a battleground- conquer or be conquered. Those that kept coming back for more had one thing in mind- to be the best! Those are the pool halls that etched this game in my soul.

mikemosconi said:

If you are old enough to remember how you got "addicted' to the "atmosphere" of this game - especially back in the 60s and 70s pool halls- you will no doubt have etched in your memory some of the following: many rooms were located either up or down a staircase - you will still remember vividly that about the time you reached the mid level of that stairway- up or down- the sound of clicking pool balls let you know that you were just about to enter a sanctuary unsurpassed by anything imaginable at street level .

Secondly, as you took your first step into the room- there was always a certain smell ( all the elements of smoke, old carpeting, poor ventilation, etc.) combining towards an unmistakeable odor- the pool hall!

Third: always the front desk man, always the house table, always the cue locker, always the large front desk time stamp clock, seldom: food service, bar service, women, music.

Fourth, but maybe most memorable- the first time you walked up or down those stairs into the room with your very own cue and case- a sign that you had bought into the mystique! To me, it was a battleground- conquer or be conquered. Those that kept coming back for more had one thing in mind- to be the best! Those are the pool halls that etched this game in my soul.

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My God... Other than it being in the late 80's for me, and the lack of what I would coin "women", you absolutely nailed it...lol

Biloxi Boy said:

I played everywhere. I was a paperboy and the Triangle Poolhall was on my route. I constantly hung out there, and I later worked there before I went to college. I lived next door to Keesler Air Force Base which had a large number of barracks which had a large number of "day rooms" (always unlocked) which usually had an old Brunswick table in them. Security was lax and my buddies and I would hunt up an empty day room and play pool until we were kicked out. Biloxi has always been a gambling town, and pool provided another way to gamble. It was not so much that we had pool players who gambled -- we had gamblers who played and bet on pool. Pool Halls were everywhere when I was young, and, later, the bar tables were too many to be counted. Before Keesler arrived in WWII, Biloxi's population was 6,000 and there was approximately 15 pool halls in town. Today, there is not a single pool hall remaining.

College expanded my horizons and I discovered pool, and billiards, in the Student Union. I learned 14:1 from Northerners, and foreign exchange students taught me billiards (despite my having tremendous language barriers with both groups). Playing for beers in bars occurred only if the bars were open. After college, despite a 4 year degree, I returned to my nautical roots and worked on offshore supply vessels, playing on any table I found from Houma to Freeport. Probably played Hu, just didn't know it.

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I suspect many on AZB had passing acquaintanceships somewhere and somewhen in the past. I was always Hu except a month or two I tried the silliness after the color of money when everyone was using an alias! When I was in the mood to jack with somebody I'd tell them the name they were using wasn't the one they were using two weeks ago just to watch the back tracking and stuttering start! I was almost always right that anybody that could make three balls in a row was hustling and not using their own name.

I realized that aliases were silly and went back to Hu. No last name and I never explained how I spelled it. For some reason I picked up a lot of nicknames without ever using them myself. As long as they weren't pool related I didn't care.

I think you touched on the real reason for the downturn in pool. Used to be gamblers played pool to gamble. Now there are many ways that don't require near the effort to learn to play pool at least moderately well. Now people can gamble all they want to without relying on anything but luck. Deep down most feel they have a better chance with luck than skill anyway.

Hu