Bowling alleys across America light up the sky with a frenetic neon argasm as they fill to capacity with ardent afficianado's looking for that perfect score. In this game, it's not simply "three strikes and yer out!" There is no heavy weight championship belt with a buckle as big as Texas and as heavy as your grandfathers '57 Buick. No amigo, your reward is much simpler, much more of the people, by the people and for the people of Carnarsies Bowling Alley and Bar down the street. You get something Rodney Dangerfield wanted all his life and Aretha spelled out in song...R. E S P E C T! The respect and adulation and adoration you can only get get from other bowlers...and best of all, you get the coveted honor of being allowed to buy the next round of beer for the faithful followers of Ten Pin Alley!
Like the gunfighters of the old west...you can tell the suburban bowling semi-pro at a glance. He or she have their own bowling ball bag to carry their own personal coveted bowling ball weapon of choice. A three holed weapon of mass ten pin destruction as it rolls down the lane, a heat seeking missle, a rolling drone looking to knock out ten pins who defiantly hold their ground, praying silently with bowed bowling heads that the destructive force will roll into the gutter and explode harmlessly without causing any collageral damage to the ten pins standing as stalwart as any Band of Brothers. Sometimes nine pins bite the dust, and there is one man left standing. It's time for another ball to bring it down. It's Gary Cooper and High Noon all over again as they meet face to face in the dusty street, machismo flowing before the bowling bullets let loose a volley..and when the smoke clears..only then does the victor emerge...man or pin? It depends generally on how much beer the bowler consumed before hand. The pin is always sober, always ready for action.
All sports have their hero's, even fallen ones like Tiger Woods and O J Simpson. The closest thing to a poster child and role model in bowling is the character Pal in the John Candy film, "Uncle Buck" . Sporting his nifty Fifties bowling shirt of gaudy gauze and toothpick in his mouth that dangles and dances as he tries to put the make on Candy's young niece. Great phrases in American history abound...Remember the Alamo! Remember the Maine! But who can forget Pal asking..."So, do you like all terrrain vehicles? I bet you're a cheerleader or something, you look very firm!" Now there's a battle cry! In popular culture, bowling has been used as a sports backdrop from The Honeymooners to the Flintstones, almost as if Fred and Barney and Ralph and Norton conspired to spread the cartoon slapstick manifesto to the world of rolling balls and give it the seal of approval, which it did!
Bowling didn't energe from the womb as a child of 50's television with "Bowling for Dollars" In fact, it appears af form of it was a favorite pastime amongst ancient Egyptians ("bowl like an Egyptian!) when they weren't engaged in mummification or conquering other civilizations. Some of the earliest traces of bowling were discovered in the 1930's by a British archeologist in the grave of a small child in Egypt. The objects appeared to be from a crude form of bowling as they practiced it. Once dating on the objects was carried out, it was estimated that the objects dated from 3200 BC. (BC? Bowling Championship?)
The Romans were pretty enthusiastic about the sport as well. Sport? Game? There is a difference, but not sure which it is. In the Roman version they tossed large stones to see who's stone would come closest to a point stone, in effect, the roots of the game of bocce which evolved eventually into bowling as we know it today.
The Romans loved this game more than the weekly crucifixions and it soon spread throughout their conquered kingdoms and took a lasting foot hold in Britain which the Romans had subjugated and occupied for centuries. Eventually the Romans were run out of town as thier empire crumbled. Now it was the bickering Normans and Saxons who began battleaxing it out in England, but, bowling remained and was a popular pastime as early as 1366. It was eventually outlawed as the knights in shining armor spent more time polishing up on their bowling prowess and spending less time on the basics of archery and sword play! The Round Ball had replaced the Round Table and that was not good for the Empire
. Persecution in Europe over religion and freedom of speech drove settlers to American shores in a flood of humanity, and they brought more than a love of freedom from persecution. They also brought their love of bowling with them and began to pave the bowling brick road that increased the sports popularity before the Redcoats and Revolution and Boston Teaparty. The first mention of bowling in American Literature was by Washington Irving. Rip Van Winkle wakes up after 20 years of sleep, not to the sounds of an alarm clock or rooster crowing, but to the sounds of the "crashing ninepins". Bowling in early America was purely an outdoor activity. No fancy alleys, pin monkeys, beer and burgers, or ATM machines. It was called simply enough "lawn bowling" and the first permanent lawn location set up for the sport was in New Yorks Battery area in the heart of todays financial district. So when they say Occupy Wall Street" they really mean they just want to get a game or two in of strikes and spares. No one ever went into battle yelling, Occupy Lane #5!!
As it's popularity grew, problems arose too. Remember, where there are sports, there are sportsmen, and sportsmen love to gamble. This was the case with bowling just as it was for playing poker, rolling dice, horseracing and now, rolling balls. In 1841 Connecticut was the first state to outlaw bowling lanes, but, it was so popular it went underground and the public prohibition of bowling was about as senseless as the prohibition of alcohol in the age of Capone and his cronies. Besides, a lot of wealthy patrons of the sport simply installed private lanes in their mansions!
The ten pin game began a gradual erosion over nine pins in the late 1800's, but, there were no hard and fast rules as there are today as to ball weights and pin dimensions. These actually varied region by region, state by state, until a gentleman and ardent bowling enthusiast, Joe Thum began organizing regional bowling clubs and by 1895 in NYC, the American Bowling Congress was established with standardized rules for play, pins and balls. It was the new age of national competitions, and at first it was strictly a mens only club with women banned from the sport until 1917 when the Womens International Bowling Congress was born in St. Louis eventually becoming the Women's National Bowling Association. Unlike lady golfers, no one has accused a ladie bowler or pool championship of having lesbian inclinations. That is still reserved for lady golfers, tennis players and Amazon archery competitors with one breast.However, Girl on girl bowling ball action does have a certain appeal. Hell girl on girl with a two large bowling pins involved could be the stuff that dreams are made of in the Wide Wide World of Vaginal Sports!
As the game morphed and evolved, the technology changed as well. The balls were once made of hard wood, were replaced in 1905 by the first rubber ball. Then it happened...the big bang in the bowling universe ocurred in 1914 as the Brunswick Corporation introduced the mineralite ball with it's "mysterious rubber compound" It was the second coming of Bowling Jesus as he spread the gutter ball gospel to the assembled turning water into stale beer and nachos!
Automation is everywhere today, replacing humans with machines to manufacture products and goods, but AMF corporation which specialized in bakery equipment decided to jump into the bowling craze fray and started to manufacture and to market the automatic pinspotter.in 1951 and the human "pin monkey" became not only an endangered species, but by 1953, was as distinct as the dodo bird and the dinosaur.
As the Fabulous Fifties rocked and rolled, bowling rolled more than gutter balls and hit a perfect score on the small screen of television as it's popularity exploded with shows like Make That Spare, Celebrity Bowling and of course, Bowling for Dollars. ABC led the TV assault as the first network to telecast national competition of the Pro Bowlers Association. Later the Ladies Pro Bowlers Tour took to the airwaves.
Today bowling is more popular than ever enjoyed by an estimated 95 million people worldwide and there is now global competition. The sport is growing...maybe it's the shirts ... or the ambiance of the alley...the crashing crescendo as ball meets pin in a head on collision..or maybe it's all much simpler than that..Maybe, just maybe..it's because BOWLERS HAVE BALLS!