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By Robert Palmer
The photo above is from the early 50s. Daddy (Mr. Haddon Palmer) is the one that is second from the right holding a cue with his left hand on the table. I don't have any idea who the others are but it would be fun to find out. One person that worked for him was Rob Bolton. I have no idea if he's in this picture or not.
Daddy always ran a "clean" place, made sure that no rough stuff went on. People would drop kids off as they went to shop and come back and pick them up later knowing that they would be safe and looked after. I can well remember walking up the sidewalk between Mr. Claude's theater and the pool room when the street was so crowded that you'd have to weave around people and occasionally get in the street. Automobile traffic was at a crawl because of so many people.
The pool tables in this picture are either Brunswick or A.E. Schmidt tables. I think that they are the latter, but 2 or 3 manufacturers made similar tables. They are definitely not the ones we made. Daddy started making tables in about 54' or 55' so this picture pre-dates that.
Notice in the picture that the scoring beads ran the full length of the building. Usually the snooker tables were at the front. I don't know if this is the front table or not. Best I can tell from the picture it is a pool table, not a snooker table. It cost more to play snooker because it was a much slower game.
The way you determined how many tables you could get in a room was the cue length (57") from the nose of the cushion on one table to the edge of the next table or possibly a little less. Even if your cue had to go over the edge of the next table (a straight across shot) usually you would not be in the way of the players on the next table. Every inch counted. The more tables you could get in a room, the more games you could have at a time, hence, more revenue! It was a bargain at a dime a game.
"RACK IN THE BACK, JACK!"
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Related reading: Click on "Pool Hall Baby" in the box below, then scroll down and read Jo Carolyn's story.
