Pool Table Identity help- William Dethloff

[RobM]

I have inherited my grandfathers pool table and am trying to figure the manufacturer. The headrail plate (along with the cue rack) says "Wm. Dethloff 522 Broadway, Buffalo, New York."

I have tracked down the great grandson of Mr. Dethloff and he is reaching out to their extended family to see if they have any information. Mr. Dethloff did manufacture pool tables at his factory in Buffalo. I am including photos of the table, rail plate, disassembled table, cue rack, etc. There are no stamps/marks on the slates (3 pieces at 1"thick) or elsewhere except a serial number (2182) on all the pieces. The rails are attached to the table with the Brunswick style bolts (three holes- two holes to tighten the bolt and a central hole to hold the screw for the rosette cover).

From the experts who have so kindly shared their time and expertise with one really annoying motivated individual (Me!) the consensus seems to be either a Brunswick Wellington from 1903-1911 (the only years it was made.) or Mr. Dethloff made it to look just like the Wellington.

My question is, is there any way to definitively rule in or out a Brunswick table?

Thanks for any information that you can share!!

Rob

 

[garczar]

Most likely a re-badged B'wick. Lot of tables were sold that way back in the day. Sure looks like Wellington: https://www.billiardrestoration.com/antique-pool-tables/wellington.htm

 

[snookered_again]

I have a Brunswick Balke Collender table and the frame and parts are very similar, as are the legs. Yours has straight sides whereas mine have a curvature. the base frame does not come apart, on some models it did, for shipping. Brunswick was a later company.

i think its likely your grandad refinished the table and put his name on it , but who knows , he may have copied it. the slate numbers are very similar to mine.. they used a pretty large stamp.

mine has corresponding ink marks on the slate and the head is marked as such but that's ink and could wash away.

mine has a long bolt that runs just to one side of the center plank it added some rigidity. some of thether support planks arent; shown in your photo.

bolts of the day were pretty much hand made so square head and you may see some machine marks. - modern bolts are not machined they are basically forged or stamped out. you can still get repro tags and those slate bolts.. on my table the bolts are hiddent by wooden covers bt some had the fancy bolts instead. the bolts are iron and have asmall threaded hole to aceept the brass embelishment.

the pocket irons on mine are 5/16 but a somewhat odd thread, a medium pitch and not NC or NF mine has snooker rails which were re worked. It plays beautifully. the standard ball size for ( british ) snooker is 2 1/16" I believe this table is designed for 2 1/4

i can run both without any ball hop or without them being driven down into he cloth..

but use 2 1/16 as that's what we use on the12 ft tables. If you want to use 2/1'4 you can but I just like to stick with the one ball size and one cue.

If you play pool you might enjoy the big 2 1/4" balls and want about a 12 or 13mm ( 1/2" ) cue tip .

some may call it american or chinese snooker, if it's played with 2 1/4" balls. I dont know anyone here that plays that style of snoooker but its all good practice in my mind I basically use it as my home practice table then goplay on a 12' english billards table and thats a lot tougher to pocket balls on. sometimes I have frieends that I intrduse to snooker so the smaller table with the larger pocets works well for them not becoming totally frustrated. once they understand the game they tend to become addicted ;-)

some of thise old tables may have been hacked by people wanting to pay pool on them, 8 0r 9 ball, like it were a brunswick gold crown.. I believe it predates the triangular cushions. some had a label stating it had BBC "monarch cushions" mine has a repro label, you can buy them.

i have both sizes and cues but prefer to use the smaller balls and my snooker cue.

the only thing Id rather have is a vintage 12 footer but that's the largest that fits my house I'm very happy to be its current owner.. and yes it has no particleboard crap or plastic bits, and it is heavy.. made to last.

mine has rosewood with ivory inlay rails. some previous owner put a lacquer based spray coating over mine. it would be rightful to to strip and refinish. I did a test patch and decided that's not a job for right now so I'm just enjoying it

if you go into That sales literature yours may be slightly older, witht he straight sides, most of t he reallyerly ones had fancy legs. my legs ( feet) look identical to yours.


BBC did make fancy scoreboards, they also made big fancy bars, meaning the furniture you order drinks over or sit at on stools with your leg on the brass rail.
. some big beautiful ones.

 

[garczar]

There was a Dethloff that invented pool table related stuff but he lived in Wisconsin. Related?? Who knows. https://patents.google.com/patent/US691452

 

[snookered_again]

There was a Dethloff that invented pool table related stuff but he lived in Wisconsin. Related?? Who knows. https://patents.google.com/patent/US691452

William Dethloff it shows in the signature of the drawing. above he put
Wm. Dethloff, so that fits..


I came across an image someone here posted, it was essentially the same table as mine but the maker was a small company in Texas.. NOT BBC.. the image is sepia toned.. I printed it out and have it at home.

and that company was evidently short lived and bought up by BBC and most were produced by BBC.. that led me to believe BBC was not the original designer, although they made earlier tables. maybe it was a case where BBC tables were being copied. you can tell by the pic it was essentially the exact same design.

Maybe BBC was the big fish that swallowed up the competition, they had huge factories, It might not be accurate but that's the thinking I arrived at.
I believe mine was offered as carom ( no pockets ) or pool.

that signature could likely prove things? neat if that's your uncle.

I found a weird thing with mine, near the pockets there is a wooden shelf it transitions between the slate and the pocket so its a sort of horseshoe shaped wood piece. It looke like someone before had re-created it. the weird thing was that when I made a pattern and flipped it about That pocket had a way larger shelf, Id say 1/2 inch..

the construction of the part was fairly well done but the shape of the cutout was just weird, did they want to make one pocket harder than the rest? I ended up making it fit the same profile as other pockets which seemed to be unaltered. it seemed likely it got cracked up and was replaced .. the inner side of the leather pockets are tacked onto it so it likely got split by re-tacking. I think two corners were replaced and one was a lot closer to the original profile..
maybe they just didn't finish the cutout quite right.

mine was absolutely riddled with the tiniest staples Ive ever seen, it proved to me that the same guy re-felted it , probably for many years, maybe 10 times.. the tiny staples with about a 1/8" crown , stayed and he'd tear the cloth away.. I carefully pulled them all out. no glue was ever used. no trace of that.

 

[RobM]

I've done a ton of research on William Dethloff, spoken with his great grandson, birth records, death records, family history, advertising looked up, etc. I have been able to place William in Buffalo, New York as early as 1896 with ads for his business. I am unsure of his location before that but I would guess that the patent isn't his. (unless he filed it and then moved to Buffalo and it took 6 years to be filed??)

I also know he was an agent for Wagner and Sanford from 1896 through 1905. Another local business at the time was advertising as the sole agent for The Brunswick, Balke, Collender Company. I feel it unlikely that my table is a rebaged Brunswick as it wasn't his product line.

In 1906 his ads changed to “Manufacturer of Billiard and Pool Tables.” He appearently dropped Wagner and Sanford as there is no mention of them after this point.

The last mention of his business was in 1910. He would have been 65 years old, and passed away in 1923 at the age of 78.

Logically thinking it through I am inclined to believe that William built my table between 1906 and 1910. I've spoken to several top tier table restoration specialist and several table mechanics. Based on the build characteristics, the bolts used (they think the bolts are Brunswick's), etc. I think William built the table, used parts from other manufactures he couldn't produce himself (bolts), and badged them with his own name during this time period.

 

[Ssonerai]

RobM - I like your analysis and think it makes sense.

An important material clue: All the BBC catalog references state in print, or show examples with "Golden Oak" or mahogany as the 2 feature wood options. In those days, and perhaps especially in BBC literature, "Golden Oak" meant quarter-sawn white oak & w.oak veneers with prominent, and usually matched, medullary ray effect.

Your table is not mahogany.
It might be white oak, but it is flitch sawn, not QS/"Golden Oak".

It is certainly not a "homemade" table and was designed for efficiency and made with skill.
The feature flitch-sawn veneers appear to be matched around the perimeter. This would be dispensed with in a low dollar table because it is costly both in terms of material, and in terms of effort.

I had not studied the construction of tables from quite that early. (Ours is a mid-late 1920's era royal) Can you tell whether the side panels are 5ply as would have been typical for BBC? I do not believe they are solid wood, given the apparent excellent condition & the way details are end-matched, but that could be a factor in the debate.

It is not possible to see details well enough in photos, but something that might draw the Dethloff maker theory into question, is how well do the mouldings match BBC Wellington? From this distance, they appear to match quite closely in shape, proportion, and arrangement all around the cabinet and right down the legs. That is not something a typical custom builder would really bother with in a time when the Wellington was not an antique or classic. So it's back to either Dethloff was very well equipped, knowledgeable and skillfull, or he might have possibly bought the table in from BBC afterall. OTOH, Buffalo was a wood manufacturing center. It would have been easy to subcontract nearly anything there during that era.

Have you found any other tables either similar or different that can likely be attributed to Dethloff?

 

[snookered_again]

i believe I have seen in old brunswick material a comment that they could use a different veneer if desired. or something to that effect.

the BBC I have is mahogany veneer, but unfortunately was sprayed over with a dark color and they tried to do kind of a faux finish. I stripped a portion to see what it is , if it comes off, and it does dissolve easily so probably a darkened shellac coating. I can see some veneer patches were missing so I think a former owner sprayed it over as a quick fix.
Mine could be stripped and the mahogany veneer fixed although with some considerable effort. the rails on mine are rosewood with quite large ivory diamonds, so from the top view it's pretty nice. I'm not sure what species the sides are on mine but I think its solid maple beneath the veneer, they are very heavy and thick .

very old veneer was generally a lot thicker than what we see most commonly used today so if it were very thin veneer it may indicate replacement at some more recent date.

 

[RobM]

Ssonerai, I haven't been able to find any other examples of Dethloff's work and trust me, I've looked!. I've attached three pages from 1908-1911 BBC catalogs, all showing the veneered sides. They all have a flat, one piece "skirt"(i'm not sure of the correct term.) that goes all the way to the corners of the table and the legs attach below the skirt. My table is a knock down, meaning that the skirt comes apart and the legs go all the way up to the slate/rail level. I have not seen any Wellington tables that were knock downs.​

As for the veneering, I didn't get photos of the table disassembled but my recolection is that the sides we solid, not veneered, but I couln't prove that.

Rob

 

[snookered_again]

im not sure if mine is a Newport but pretty close to that era I guess.
a lot fo them have the rail bolts exposed, mine has rail covers so you could never see the bolts.
note the first one is manufactured by Kansas city billiards pool table manufacturers and has a pretty stark resemblance.

my theory is they started building these tables and BBC bough them out and built many more, but its just a theory maybe BBC made earlier tables and Knasas was copying BBC ?
I believe mine was with pockets as it is now but some were "carom" - no pockets.
that frame does not disassemble so if you ever want to move one of these be prepared. I had 4 guys and we all stepped into the frame, put it on our shoulder and the weight challenged us all. I moved it inside my house all by myself in baby steps with a come-along. and planks and rolled it on pipes.
it just
barely fit through the door with some of my house trim removed. its beautiful to play upon, the felt and rubber was all done previously. You can see what they did to the frame with overspraying it. I could wash it all off in a few hours , but then there is some veneer repair to do. I know how but I opted not to open that can of worms just right now. probably most have had replacement pockets, I think the irons are original, maybe the leather on top, its not perfect but works really nice. very silent compared to most other tables due to the slate and rails actually being bolted properly horizantally intto the edges of the slate, and not just holes in a vertical orientation through holes drilled into the slate.

because of the solud mechanical connection, and great materials, the rails are rock steady and quiet as a mouse compared to modern stuff.

 

[RobM]

Sure looks like a Newport.
PS. I love your cat photobombing you. What’s his name?

 

[Ssonerai]

three pages from 1908-1911 BBC catalogs, all showing the veneered sides. They all have a flat, one piece "skirt"(i'm not sure of the correct term.) that goes all the way to the corners of the table and the legs attach below the skirt. My table is a knock down, meaning that the skirt comes apart and the legs go all the way up to the slate/rail level. I have not seen any Wellington tables that were knock downs.​

​

Nice catch that i failed to note!
That sure seems to clinch it in my mind that Dethloff made or subcontracted it.

Skirts are the narrow pieces that cover the sides below the rails.

It is almost certain that the frame side outer panels are "5-ply" (or possibly 4 ply) meaning a poplar core (usually) with cross-bands, and a face veneer on each side. The inner veneer is probably a different wood than the outer face. On your table, this panel was then laminated to some thick frames.
You can prove or disprove my conjecture by scraping the paint off an innersurface and determining if the grain is the same as the outside. (match in species and character).

im not sure if mine is a Newport but pretty close to that era I guess.

Newport does not have the Ogee sides yours does. There are other BBC tables with a re-curve, but not Newport.

You can see what they did to the frame with overspraying it. I could wash it all off in a few hours , but then there is some veneer repair to do. I know how but I opted not to open that can of worms just right now.

Here's mine, showing veneer repairs. & discussion of why, including the inner veneers.
Finishing up today, sealing the marble i laid in the hallway, so maybe have the table up this year.
The rest of the room is almost far enough along to put the table up....except....
My buddy/hardwood flooring co says he cannot make it up to sand and finish until fall.
I feel for him, he had to go in for cancer surgery last month, now his crews are slammed for work, he need's a break so i'll wait.

Library resource for pool table repair

NYS has a mandate for "maker spaces" in libraries. I never used the local facility, but know the guy who runs it, and have often donated small amounts of plywood & materials. He has been over to the shop to use my larger machines to break down...

forums.azbilliards.com

smt

 

[Ssonerai]

not sure if mine is a Newport but pretty close to that era...

Here's one in 1911 catalog with the recurve/Ogee shape.

 

[garczar]

Til proven otherwise i still think that this table was sourced from a Brunswick model of some sort. Back then there were quite a few co's that did the exact same thing: order Brunswick frames, slates and then builD their own tops/cabinets. Very few outfits back then tried to go toe-to-toe with B'wick and make the entire table in-house.

 

[Ssonerai]

Back then there were quite a few co's that did the exact same thing: order Brunswick frames, slates and then builD their own tops/cabinets. Very few outfits back then tried to go toe-to-toe with B'wick and make the entire table in-house.

Actually, it was more like automobiles in those days - multiple factories in every city some never getting more than a few prototypes out, some lasting for a few decades. Some did buy their drive train from a bigger operation. Lycoming and Continental got their start in those days supplying a lot of car engines for odd ball brands.

Pool was huge in those days, & Blatt claims there were 80 pool table makers in NYC alone. The greater NYC metro area was filthy with woodworking shops and machine shops up well into the 1950's. Anywhere, any floor. Maybe they did buy slate from BBC. But there were also hundreds of producer quarries. IIRC, Pyramid Structural Slate Company at around the turn of the 19th C was the marketing and educational consortium of almost 200 quarries. There were plenty of table makers in any other city with a vibrant woodworking tradition, which was everywhere until plastics and sheet metal became cheaper and faster to produce for most items.

A local guy in a podunk town in MD searched me out when i was younger because he needed moldings and tooling made. He had a government job tending animals at a lab facility. Then built, restored, installed, and maintained tables in a 3 state area when he got home from that to try to calm his mind. He alone built from scratch some 70 or 80 tables but died kind of young 2- 3 pack of Luckies & 2 to 3 cartons of classic coke per day. One of the best people i ever knew. I've mentioned traveling with him to Pen Argyl to pick up slate sets, and watching it processed, including the guy taking templates from a nail on the wall, marking the pockets, and hand cutting them. Import slate killed that off mostly by the 1990's.

There's no reason the guy whose name is on the table could not have built it complete.
The fact that it knocks down, and does not have typical BBC construction or veneers suggests that.
However, he could well have bought other parts wherever they were cheapest and most convenient.
Whether BBC or some other supplier.

RobM - I think some of the stuff reported about Blatt is wrong, but i suspect it is the reporter. Have you checked with them to see if they know anything about Mr Dethloff? Should be an easy enough series of phone calls or emails?

 

[RobM]

I spoke with both Joe Newell ( the unofficial historian for Brunswick) and someone from Blatt (it was quite a while ago and I simply don’t remember, but he was their expert on all the old, old stuff.)
Unfortunately they had no information on William Dethloff, but were also of the opinion that my table most likely wasn’t a Brunswick. Although similar in style, they felt that it probably wasn’t just a rebadge of one of theirs.
Bob Dethloff (William’s great grandson) seemed to think that William manufactured his own tables at least some of the time.
So the hunt is still on. I plan to reach back out to Bob Dethloff at some point to see if he or his family found any more information after I initially contacted him.