American pool: from four-ball to nine-ball.

How billiards reached America

A long-repeated story says Spaniards brought billiards to St. Augustine, Florida, in the 1500s. The BCA says research found no trace of it, even though an older BCA booklet once stated it as fact. Dutch and English settlers are the more likely source. George Washington is reported to have won a billiards match in 1748, and by 1830 there were public rooms devoted to the game; the most famous was Bassford's in New York, which catered to stockbrokers.

The dominant American game until the 1870s was American Four-Ball, played on an 11 or 12 foot table with four pockets. Its last professional tournament was held in 1876.

Michael Phelan

The BCA calls Michael Phelan (born in Ireland in 1819, though some records say 1816; died 1871) the father of American billiards. In 1850 he published Billiards Without a Master, the first American book on the game. He added diamonds to the rails as aiming aids (Wikipedia dates this to 1854), developed a new cushion, and in 1859 began a weekly column in Leslie's Illustrated Weekly, making him the first American billiards columnist. On 12 April 1859 he beat John Seereiter in Detroit in the first major American stake match; the BCA puts the stake at $15,000. He co-founded the manufacturer Phelan & Collender and was inducted into the BCA Hall of Fame in 1993.

Why it is called "pool"

"Pool" means a collective stake. In the nineteenth century a poolroom was a betting parlor for horse racing, and billiard tables were installed so bettors could pass the time. The BCA argues the poolroom's bad reputation came from the betting, not the game. The Oxford English Dictionary links "pool" to the French poule; the oldest known use of the word for a billiards-type game is in a 1797 Virginia newspaper.

The pocket games are born

• Fifteen-ball pool (also called 61-pool) was popular by 1850. Its ball values total 120, so the first player past 61 won. It and pin pool were developed at Bassford's.
• Championships. The first American championship pool tournament was held in 1878 and won by Canadian Cyrille Dion. Championship tournaments ran almost every year from 1878 to 1956.
• Continuous pool replaced fifteen-ball pool as the championship game in 1888 (Wikipedia says it was invented in 1889). Solid and striped colored balls were in use by 1889.
• Eight-ball was invented shortly after 1900, evolving from pyramid pool.
• Straight pool dates from 1910, when Jerome Keogh introduced re-racking 14 balls with one left on the table; it was named straight pool in 1912, when the first professional 14.1 championship was held in Philadelphia.
• Nine-ball developed around 1920; its exact origin is unknown. Rudolf Wanderone (Minnesota Fats) claimed it grew up in halls that charged by the rack, but that is only his account.
• One-pocket's idea was described as early as 1775, with full British rules by 1869.

The 61 rotation game is the ancestor of rotation, nine-ball, ten-ball and Kelly pool. Billiards Digest dates nine-ball's replacement of straight pool as the main professional pocket game to 1978.

Booms and busts

Billiards was big news in the nineteenth century; results sometimes got more press than war news, including during the Civil War. By the 1920s poolrooms had a rough image, places where men loitered, smoked, fought and bet. Pool was popular with troops in World War II, and professionals gave exhibitions at military posts, but rooms closed after the war, and by the late 1950s the game seemed headed for oblivion.

The BCA was established in 1948 (one source says its predecessor became the BCA in 1947), with early involvement from Willie Mosconi and Willie Hoppe. The Hustler in 1961 set off a revival (see pop culture), and in 1966 the BCA began promoting the US Open 14.1 Championship. Interest fell again after the 1960s; the BCA links it to social concerns, the Vietnam War and the rise of outdoor co-ed activities. By 1985 only two public rooms remained in Manhattan, down from several thousand in the 1930s.

Then came another turn. Upscale rooms began opening in 1987, and Billiards Digest describes a "poolroom boom" of plush parlors by 1989. In 1991 the Boston-based room chain Jillian's made a public stock offering.