Bob Byrne has Danny McGoorty in his biography say of the 3-c billiard room at the old Bensinger's, "If you coughed, they asked you to step outside until you got control of yourself." But that doesn't mean the people in the old Bensinger's didn't enjoy themselves!
Looking at the audience, I notice two things. "You are old, Father William, you are old." (That;s from ALICE IN WONDERLAND.) I hope that they have players in the pipeline. Thirty years ago I learned that a rather formal older gentleman in a European billiard club had become "Youth Counselor" for the club. I asked him why he had taken the position, and he said, "We must make sure we have a next generation!" Surprisingly he loved the kids after he got to know them, and they loved him, despite the fact that he had the manners of an earlier and very different generation.
The second thing I notice is that the people in the audience look prosperous! If I were a businessman and wanted to sell something, I would be asking how I could get the Euro's out of these guys pockets, for I would be fairly sure there were Euro's in those pockets.
I once attended an international match between Germany and Austria. It was held in a billiard club in the Ruhrgebiet which was very working class. With winter outside and the building surviving from about 1880, we drank beer and brandy to keep warm, and we kept our topcoats on. In the first match, brilliantly played, two young Austrian brothers defeated two young German opponents in balkline billiards. I went to the bathroom after the two matches, and, while I was washing my hands, the person next to me said, "Boy! That was billiards as it should be played." I said, yes, it had been, what a shame the Germans had had to lose both matches. His reply was, "Come on, now. We don't want to be soccer fans."
And we have people who think that the Mosconi Cup is going to bring back pool.
