I remember when I was around 16 I was invited by one of the regulars to come to Monmouth Illinois to play some of the 'old timers'(I R 1 now), don't remember the name of the pool hall, but the stench was hard to bear. The tables played like they were covered in berber carpet that was a little sticky, and about every 6 feet around the bar were spittoons, where accuracy wasn't a requirement. I'm retired now, but has anyone else had an experience like this?
Anybody old enough to remember spittoons around the bar?
- Thread starter tim913
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The first job I ever had, was cleaning spitoons for free table time at the pool hall..Cleaning the floor around them was even worse, because as the OP said, accuracy was never a high priority!..At the time, (late 40's) every bar and pool room had plenty of spitoons! 
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The thing that killed the spittoon was TB actually. That disease prompted anti-spitting laws all over the country. As a physician I was actually surprised that people still remember spittoons. I would have thought they went away earlier than that, like before WWII. Obviously I was wrong.
By the time I hit the pool halls they were already gone.
By the time I hit the pool halls they were already gone.
They were still around in the 40's and 50's in Texas
Bars in Mexico had these when I was a kid......
The little town I'm from only had one poolroom, and it was in the back of a Chinese restaurant.
The owner was poor and couldn't afford spittoons so if a patron needed to spit he had to go outside. Many a time I've seen someone running for the backdoor, their cheeks bulging with tobacco juice. A few feet from the rear entrance was a pile of dried chew that had grown to nearly three feet high.
When the town's folk ate at the restaurant up front, they knew better than to use the soy sauce. :smile:
The owner was poor and couldn't afford spittoons so if a patron needed to spit he had to go outside. Many a time I've seen someone running for the backdoor, their cheeks bulging with tobacco juice. A few feet from the rear entrance was a pile of dried chew that had grown to nearly three feet high.
When the town's folk ate at the restaurant up front, they knew better than to use the soy sauce. :smile:
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I actually have occasionally seen one here or there. Sometimes with sand in it to be used as an ash tray. Sometimes just as part of the decor in an old bar, but not in use. I don't think I have ever seen one in use. In fact they are probably illegal in most places in the US.
I do remember seeing on in a bar in rural Arizona. There was a sign above it. Something like: "Please don't use the spittoon". It was just a decoration in an old bar.
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They still have them in bars across country. Not many, but you'd be surprised.
I actually found one in my dads garage last week. Took awhile to clean it up and have it in my home room. I will post a picture of it tomorrow.
when I was a kid here in Alabama the pool room had them along the walls there was as much on the walls as in the can there was allot of action and cussing the owner was in a wheel chair after he closed the city has blocked any one from opening a another pool room here in Blountsville AL got my education there LOL
The poolhalls in Roswell, N.M. had tem. I was there in the 60s
Smitty
Smitty