Write for us! Guest Post Guidelines for PoolHistory.Com

Write for us! Guest Post Guidelines for PoolHistory.Com

by | Jul 15, 2019 | Historic Players, Historic Rooms, Historical Notes, Hustler Stories, Industry History

The Pool History Website accepts guest posts. W e accept guest posts. Interested in a historical pool match? A famous player from yesteryear? We pay a standard fee of $50 for accepted submissions upon publication. From left, Georgie Jansco, Eddie Taylor and Paulie Jansco We consider completed posts, as well as original pitches. Send queries to R.A. Dyer at poolhistory@gmail.com. Writers should...

Memories of Bill “Weenie Beenie” Bill Staton

by | Jun 23, 2019 | Historic Players, Hustler Stories, Weenie Beenie

Johnny Carson, Mamie Van Doren and Bill “Weenie Beenie” Staton on the Tonight Show. I have collected here a few stories about Bill “Weenie Beenie” Staton, who was one of our sport’s more colorful promoters and players during the 1960s. The owner of Jack & Jill’s Cue Clubs, Staton died on Feb. 18, 2006 in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, his hometown. He...
Wimpy Lassiter’s World War II Coast Guard records

Wimpy Lassiter’s World War II Coast Guard records

by | May 17, 2019 | Historic Players, Wimpy Lassiter

Pool legend Wimpy Lassiter spent most of his World War II days on one of three Coast Guard cutters operating from Norfolk, Virginia. By then the Navy had subsumed the Coast Guard for the war effort and Lassiter’s cutters — designated CG 83511, CG 74307, CG 74306 respectively — were charged with rescuing men from the ocean after German u-boat attacks. By all accounts Lassiter made for a...
Cranfield, Plus Record Runs Official and Otherwise

Cranfield, Plus Record Runs Official and Otherwise

by | Apr 11, 2019 | Babe Cranfield, Historic Players, Willie Mosconi

UPDATE: John Schmidt is said to have broken the record on Memorial Day, May 27, 2019 — running 626 on a nine-foot table in Monterrey, California. We’ll post video and details as they become available. Back in 2010 I received a note from reader Dave Capone, who told me about an encounter with the late Hall of Famer Arthur “Babe” Cranfield. Cranfield, as you may recall, was...
Don “Cincinnati Kid” Willis and the Big Hoorah Hustle

Don “Cincinnati Kid” Willis and the Big Hoorah Hustle

by | Apr 9, 2019 | Historic Players, Hustler Stories, Wimpy Lassiter

The two out-of-towners are relatively short men, in their thirties, the unfortunate age when the paunch begins to show. Neither carries a pool cue. They’ve appeared unannounced and unexpected in a back-water pool room, which they immediately size up.  Who in here has some gamble to them?  They get a table. They rack for nine-ball. They start shooting. “Remember...

Video: Legend Taberski Performs Trick Shots

by | Apr 7, 2019 | Billiards Video, Frank Taberski, Historic Players, Pool Videos

Here’s some footage of Frank Taberski performing a number of trick shots, including “Chinese Pool,” which was a popular variation of the game during the early 20th Century. Mike Shamos, in his excellent New Illustrated Encyclopedia of Billiards, described Chinese Pool as a game “in which the cue ball is not stroked but is instead rolled down the groove formed by two cue...