Omaha daily bee., 1917-02-11
FOUR MORE DAYS TO
ENTER PIN TOURNEY
Secretary Langtry Moves to
Grand Rapids for Final
A. B. O. Drive.
WORK ON ALLEYS STARTS

Grand Rapids, Mich, Feb. 10.-Only
four more days are left for the bowl
ers to enter the seventeenth annual
tournament of the American Bowling
congress, scheduled to open in the
Coliseum building in this city on
March 3. Secretary Abe Langtry, the
American Bowling congress official
who is general manager of the big
tournaments, will leave for here to-
morrow and will open the bowlers'
great headquarters at the Hotel Pant
lind tomorrow night, staying in Grand
Rapids until the last ball has been
shot and the final check mailed to the
lowest prize winner.
Langtry is up to his ears in mail
these days and figures that he has
nearly two-thirds of the total entry
listed already. His latest estimate Of
the number of entries in his hands
was $50 fve-man teams, any definite
figures being unobtainable until the
list has been closed for several days,
as he has several American Bowling
congress officials acting as his assist
ants IN various cities in the country
who are equally authorized with him
o take entriea
Chicago Hits Mark.
Judge Howard is handling Chna-
go's big entry and announced yester-
day that 1t had passed the 100 mark,
with every indication that it would 60
to LIS. Information received by him
early in the week showed that towns
close to Chicago such as Rockford,
E(gin, Aurora, Lake Forest, Kenosha
and Racine would supply over fifty
more clubs and it looked as though
there would be close to 20n clubs
alone from the district comprised in
circle drawn seventy-fve miles
away from Chicago.
Grand Rapids has responded well to
the efforts of Secretary Lee H.
Bierce, who is handling the home en-
try, and it looks as though there may
be 200 hves composed of local talent,
The rest of Michigan, led by Detroit,
with iafty teams, ought to supply at
least another 100 clubs, while Ohio
is being figured on for about $50, with
big delegations from Indiana, Ken
lucky, Pittsburgh, New York and the
states west Of the Mississippi.
Peoria Has Rail.
Reports as to the next tournament
city seem still vague, although it looks
as though Peoria has the rail, with
Cincinnati and Buffalo close seconds,
A report that Milwaukee was in the
field for the 1918 meet was effectively
killed by a letter from Secretary
Langtry, who told the Milwaukee
boosters that his city was unfavor-
ably situated in regard to a building
that would permit the holding of a
tournament as successfully as othe,
cities.
Special trains are going to figure
largely this year in the big kegel-
fest Chicago having arranged for sew
eral specials, one of them being a
trainload Of members of the Chicago
Athletic, Illinois Athletic and other
similar organizations which will shoe,
its games the second week of the
meet Indianapolis and Fort Wayne
have signed for a special from the
Hoosicr state, while Garry Hermann
is said to have a Cincinnati and Co.
lumbus special framed that will carry
a host of boosters in a desperate en-.
deavor to land the next meet. Buf.
falo will also come strong with q
special train with Vice President John
Smith as its leader.
Work on the sixteen alleys that are
to be laid in the Coliseum here vii
be started tomorrow, with Charley
Collier OF Chicago and Jess Gruver o.
this city m charge. Sets Of pins tc
the number of 800 have been laid aside
by the alley builders for the big meet
and they claim that the conditions al
the coming meet will be as ideal 10.
high scores as any that they have
ever laid, as they have a practically
perfect solid floor on which to lay thu
big sweep Of drives.