The representative., 1895-09-25
WHO INVENTED BILLIARDS?

:. Nopooy quite knows who invented bill
Hards. one account says that the game
was first played in Italy and another that
1t first saw the light in Spain. 1t is also
affirmed that it was first played in Eng
land In the Middle Ages. 1t is histor-
ical fact that the knights Templars
brought it back with them to that coun-
try on their return from the Second
Crusade. There is also good reason to
believe that the game was played in the
monasteries of France in the sixteenth
century.
It's origin'was probably bowling, var
iation of which was the old game of
ground billiards." From that it began
to be played on table, driving one ball
through an ivory arch and then to a
raised point made also Of ivory. This
was the game for many years, each of
the two players having a ball, the third
ball not being introduced until just after
the middle of the eighteenth century,
when what was known as the port and
ring also disappeared.
In Harleian manuscript in the Brit
1sh Museum is found the earliest histor-
ical reference to billiards. This is inter-
eStlng enough to give in detail In the
year 1547 commission was appointed to
make an inventory of the goods and
chattels of Edward VI, and among the
items found at his palace at 'The More
Rickmansworth," was lone billet bourde
covered with creme clothe." This palace
was confiscated by Henry VIII, having
originally belonged to Cardinal Wolsey,
and there is little question but what that
great historical caracter actually essayed
the game himself, though no record has
come down as to whether he was as good
a billiard player as he was a statesman
few, but not many, of the old writ
erS refer to billiards, "Faery Queene"
Spenser being one of them. Shakes
peare in his"Antony and Cleopatra"
makes that amorous queen, by an anach-
ronism, play the game and also appre-
ciate its fine points. Ben Jonson, Smollet
Burton and Loche all made reference to
billiards in their works.
The game was slowly deVelOped The
tables was sometimes round, sometimes
square, oblong, oval and even octagonal
Not until the beginning of this century
did the billiard-table appear somewhere
near its present form. Prior to 1910
neither india-rubber cushions, the slate
bed, the tapering cue with it's tin and
the rest had been invented.
The third ball was introduced by way
of France in the middle of the eigh-
teenth century, and the game was then
known as the carambole. From this has
been derived the word carom. BARLEY &
Carr, the proprietors of a fashionable
billiard room in Bath, England, over
halfa century ago, invented the now
well known side strOke-striking the ball
low with bevel-topped cue-Carr devils
ing billiard chalk, which he gave the
name of the magic twisting chalk" He
packed it in pill boxes and made fortune
by selling it to the fashionables of that
day at half a crown (62 cents box The
cork tip was invented by Capt. Mingaud
a Frenchman who was imprisoned early
in the present century, but through a
special dispensation was allowed the use
of billiard table in his apartment that
he might while away the monotony of
his prison life While incarcerated he
studied out this improvement, and had
the satisfaction afterwards of seeing it
taken up all through England and the
Continent.