Abe Rich stories or cues?
- Thread starter ELBeau
- Start date
Abe Rich? Florida Cue? Star Cue? Rich Cue? It's in the family anyway.
It is thought to be a sixties cue, but I don't know for sure.
Found here in Florida, in nearly perfect condition, just needs a tip.
Interestingly, it is a sixty inch cue.
Very interesting to read the stories about Abe Rich. A lot of history there.
It is thought to be a sixties cue, but I don't know for sure.
Found here in Florida, in nearly perfect condition, just needs a tip.
Interestingly, it is a sixty inch cue.
Very interesting to read the stories about Abe Rich. A lot of history there.
i lived in miami from the 1980s until 2000
i need help in how to post a pic of the abe rich cue i have
i would go by his shop from time to time since i lived near it
he was great to talk to
as "south beach" got more famous his shop was an enigma to the area
you could feel the love of making cues from his voice when he talked to you
R.I.P abe
you were a "mench"
in jewish that is a very favorable thing to say about someone
(abe was jewish)
i need help in how to post a pic of the abe rich cue i have
i would go by his shop from time to time since i lived near it
he was great to talk to
as "south beach" got more famous his shop was an enigma to the area
you could feel the love of making cues from his voice when he talked to you
R.I.P abe
you were a "mench"
in jewish that is a very favorable thing to say about someone
(abe was jewish)
John Barton found the WLRN article here http://wlrnunderthesun.org/2009/01/the-pool-cue-maker/
Thank you for sharing this. I walked out this morning and was cold in the 60 degree temperature, wishing I had put on a sweatshirt.
It is important to read such stories and remember the sufferings of people like Abe. As I read I thought of how petty my discomfort was and how I was only a few seconds away from the warmth of my home.
To read and remember the loss and atrocities committed during the War put things in perspective quickly. I doubt I would have survived.
To Mr. Rich,
May you never be forgotten.....
It is important to read such stories and remember the sufferings of people like Abe. As I read I thought of how petty my discomfort was and how I was only a few seconds away from the warmth of my home.
To read and remember the loss and atrocities committed during the War put things in perspective quickly. I doubt I would have survived.
To Mr. Rich,
May you never be forgotten.....
I have 5 butts that abe never finished.
abe Rich unfinished butts
I have 5 unfinished butt out of his shop
I have 5 unfinished butt out of his shop
kinda biter/sweet memories. i called abe after seeing him in the blue book. i was curious about his early days in new york. he talked about how celebrities would stop in and get cues. he seemed fond of those days but when he moved to Florida he said people forgot about him. they were getting big prices for cues up north but he couldn't. i told him i was making cues and he replyed that he didn't think much of the way cues were made these days. he did things the old way. abe commented on how one time a current,prominent cuemaker had stopped by and could not believe how abe was doing it on his outdated equipment. abe offered to let him try but the cuemaker turned him down, he didn't know how to use it. i ran into that cuemaker later and its true. i told abe that i understood as the lathe i use was built around 1917-20.......boy did his voice change. we chatted more about old machinery and out of the blue he asks me to come over and make a few cues together. "i would love to" i replied,"but i live up north and i don't have the cash or means to get there". he understood and offered if i ever get down there to stop in. a few years later and still couldn't get time off,no money,other plans, etc., then at the super billiards expo i see an asian guy selling off blanks from abe's shop. after talking to him he told me abe had passed away and he got some of the inventory. when i think of abe and all the old stuff he had, the history behind it and the knowledge...........people missed it. they probably gleaned him like a scene from "zorba the greek" but the real valuable stuff, the gold overlooked in abe's shop was....ABE RICH.....and i missed it, i missed it. wished i could have made i cue with him
That's a great story, Andy. Abe was definitely unique. That would've been something to have made a cue with him. I've never seen a butterfly cue that he built, but wouldn't it have been something if you guys had met up and he built a few butterflies?
Abe was working in his shop until the day he got sick and had to go to the hospital. He knew I was interested in building cues and sold me some purpleheart, rosewood, goncalo alves, zebra wood, cocobolo and maple. The volume of wood he had was astounding. One of the shaft blanks I picked out had a USPS stamp on it from 1970!
I uploaded the WLRN story (MP3) format to Rapidshare for anyone interested in it. https://rapidshare.com/files/3957891720/abe_Rich_WLRN_story.mp3
Abe was working in his shop until the day he got sick and had to go to the hospital. He knew I was interested in building cues and sold me some purpleheart, rosewood, goncalo alves, zebra wood, cocobolo and maple. The volume of wood he had was astounding. One of the shaft blanks I picked out had a USPS stamp on it from 1970!
I uploaded the WLRN story (MP3) format to Rapidshare for anyone interested in it. https://rapidshare.com/files/3957891720/abe_Rich_WLRN_story.mp3
I was in Subic Bay in '77 when a typhoon wreaked havoc in the area. Weather was so bad that the ship I was on had to weather the storm asea.
Me and 12 other guys volunteered to bring relief rations to villages that had been 'hardest hit'. Uh, Ok. That's one way to describe it.
My reference to what you were saying is this-it is DIFFICULT, at best, to try to convey the real despair and hopelessness that we as humans feel without having been sufferers of same.
One of my life's most poignant lessons was when we pulled into one of those villages-guys walking around with AKs ( we were instructed to SAY NOTHING-just drop the stuff in some villages)...monkeys screaming in the trees...the stench of the places...young children laughing and shouting at us as they followed our small convoy.
One of those children, a little girl of maybe 10 or 12, was smiling and laughing at us-and I will never forget the sores she had all over her-about the size of Dollar pieces...laughing and reaching up to try to get us to give her something..ANYTHING.
And I remember thinking what a piece of shit I was for being upset that my TV had went on the fritz...such shame...
Here she was with NOTHING-they lived in huts without electricity and such, and in her eyes you could see she knew no better and was smiling and happy at me, and through her suffering drove a spike through my soul and destroyed any possibility of ever,again, being ungrateful for having the life I do.
It's practically impossible to put yourself in the shoes of other people, to vicariously live their lives and be thankful for all that YOU DO HAVE...without experiencing the tragedies that mold our fellow travelers.
When I think life has dealt me a poor hand or been unkind to me I cannot run from the vision of her smiling face and the sores all over her...it's not even worthy of a whack to the back of my head...the truth that I have been blessed and fortunate to not have suffered like this little gal and the Rich family...to name a few of our compadres.
And I also believe that there is a palpable, inherent, value in possessing a cue or ANYTHING made by people such as the Rich family, and that it is a gift of sorts of remembering something of character formed by hands that ACTUALLY cared and TOOK PRIDE in what they did.
Compare it to possessing a chest of drawers made by a craftsman in colonial Willimsburg or...I don't know, Ikea...get it?
Like the sentiments shared by "Macguy"-he has the 'privilege' of being able to say, "I meant so much to Abe that I hurt his feelings." And vice versa.
And how great to have finally mended the fences of the egos involved before it was too late!
And Hemingway's advice of writing drunk and editing sober? I have dispensed with such nonsense:grin: so my apologies...
Hell, I'm in Vegas afterall. And what's written in Vegas...stays...
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good bump Beau, glad you did.....
Around 1980 I visited Abe's shop on 5th st. I bought a sneaky that I still have but I'm not sure if Abe actually built it himself. It's a spliced 4 point with a small butt cap and the butt has an orange-like finish. He had several racks of these sneakys in wood racks with plywood doors. Abe's shop was oldschool, even back then
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Thread resurrection! :grin: Gotta love the history and the cues!
This is the zebrawood Rich cue I posted earlier in this thread:
What I found interesting is that the shafts interchange perfectly with my other Rich cue. Joint diameter matches perfectly, and they screw on perfectly straight.
This is the zebrawood Rich cue I posted earlier in this thread:
What I found interesting is that the shafts interchange perfectly with my other Rich cue. Joint diameter matches perfectly, and they screw on perfectly straight.
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