Irving Crane

Irving Crane (November 13, 1913 – November 17, 2001), nicknamed "the Deacon",Pool & Billiard Magazine (1996-2003). P&B's Daily News: ESPN Classic, TV schedule for Nov. 15, 2005 . Retrieved November 22, 2006. was an American pool player from Livonia (near Rochester).Billiard Congress America (1995-2005). BCA Hall of Fame Inductees: 1977 - 1984. Retrieved November 22, 2006. He was frequent champion and leading player in the sport.OnePocket.org (2004). Rack ‘em up with Danny DiLiberto. Retrieved November 22, 2006.Friends of Mount Hope Cemetery (1997). The Friends of Mount Hope Newsletter, Volume 17, Number 1. Boston Shorty, a.k.a. Morton Goldberg (1916-1996): One of the Greatest Pool Players by Richard O. Reisem. Retrieved November 22, 2006."The Gentleman is a Champ", by Bruce Venzke, The National Billiard News, January 1979. Retrieved June 17, 2007 He is most well known for his skill at the game of straight pool (14.1 continuous). He won six world billiards titles in this game.Billiards Digest (2000). A Rusty Game? Are today's players out of stroke when it comes to 14.1? by Bob Jewett. Billiards Digest Magazine. July 2000 issue, pages 22-24.

Early life
Crane became very interested in billiards when he was 11 years old. He started play on a toy pool table his brother received as a Christmas gift. His parents soon replaced their dining room table with a 4' by 8' pool table. Soon, Crane started to play in public at a local pool room."The Last of a Rare Breed", by T.S. O'Connell, page 29, Snap Magazine. Retrieved August 4, 2007 Crane could play all day and never get bored. He could not wait to get home from school and start to play pool.

Though he taught himself to play, at age 14 he ran 89 balls in straight pool at a local pool room. He called each shot in advance. His parents replaced the smaller table with a full size tournament table. Over the next ten years some of the best players, including Willie Hoppe and Andrew Ponzi, came to practice with Crne. Despite consistent play throughout his teenage years, Crane did not enter any tournaments until he was 23 years old.

In February 1939, at age 26, Crane sank 150 balls in a row against his opponent in an exhibition straight pool match. The game was played on a difficult 5' by 10' table in Layton, Utah. This was impressive. But the crowd cheered him, and he continued to play. He finally put 309 consecutive balls thus shattering the previous world record of 244 consecutive balls.R.S.B. (rec.sport.billiard). Date of copyright unlisted. Q and A with Michael Ian Shamos, founder and curator of the Biliard Archive . Retrieved November 22, 2006.

World titles
He won his first world title in 1942. Over the next thirty years, Crane won almost two dozen major championships, including the World Crown in 1946, 1955, 1966, 1968, 1970 and 1972, the Ballantine International Championship in 1965, the International Roundrobin championship in 1968, and the World Series of Billiards in 1978 at age 65. At the 1966 World Crown tournament, he ran 150 and out in the finals. He never let his opponent back to the table after an early safety battle. No other player has ever done this. Crane also holds the record for the most runner-up finishes for the World Crown with 13.

Crane found it hard to make a living only by playing pool, even though he was very skilled. In 1957, he began working as a Cadillac salesman at a dealership in Rochester, New York. He continued there for 17 years. At Rochester's annual auto show his dealership's exhibit had a pool table. Crane would run balls while answering questions. Working at a regular job was not Crane's first choice. In an interview with Sports Illustrated in 1969, he said "If I had to make a choice between selling cars and playing pool, I'd choose pool... The only time I've ever been really happy is when I was at a pool table."

He was "tall, lean man with the imperial bearing of the headmaster of Eton,"Billiards Digest (1999).  50 Greatest Players of the Century by Kenneth Shouler. Billiards Digest Magazine. October 1999 issue, page 60. Crane got the nickname The Deacon because of his gentlemanly ways, his very cautious approach to the game and his careful style of clothing. He always wore a conservative suit when he played.

Conservative style
The Los Angeles Times interviewed Crane's wife Althea. They were married 64 years. She said, "A lot of people, if it was a hot day and there was no air conditioning, they'd take off their coat to play. But not Irving Crane." Minnesota Fats, once said, "Irv Crane would have been the only guy to notice the horse under Lady Godiva". Willie Mosconi criticized Crane for his cautious style. He wrote in his 1993 autobiography, Willie's Game, that "Crane wouldn't take a shot unless his grandmother could make it."

Later life
Crane became a member of the Billiard Congress of America's hall of fame in 1978. In 1999, Crane was  number eight on Billiard Digest's fifty greatest players of the century.Sun-Times News Group (2006). NOTEWORTHY, Chicago Sun-Times, December 15, 1999, by Elliott Harris. In 1980 Crane retired from professional play. He stopped playing entirely in about 1996. On 17 November 17 2001, four days after entering a nursing home, Crane died of natural causes. He was 88 years old.

References

Category:Sportspeople from New York (state)
Category:1913 births
Category:2001 deaths
Category:Cue sports players