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Billiards - The Transformation Years 1845 - 1897
from: Michael RussellIn this article we're going to continue our transformation years
with the changes that were made in billiard balls to begin with.
The early billiard balls were made of wood. They were easy to
shape, inexpensive and readily available. In the 1600s ivory
billiard balls came into use. While they were more playable than
wood they were very expensive and only the very rich could
afford them. And while they were nice to look at they never were
very dependable. They also took a very long time to make as the
tusk softening process took almost two years. Ivory billiard
balls could split or fracture easily if not made just right. New
balls had to be broken in gently by being struck softly for the
first couple of months.
Finally in 1869 an Albany chemist mixed nitrocellulose with
camphor under high pressure. This resulted in a hard, shiny,
mouldable substance he called celluloid. The man's name was John
Wesley Hyatt and while he didn't know it at the time, he had
just invented the world's first plastic. It was this discovery
that led to improvements in billiard balls to this very day. In
April of that same year Hyatt discovered "collodion," which was
actually an early form of celluloid. The addition of collodion
to the surface of the balls resulted in a hard and perfectly
smooth surface. Unfortunately, the new balls could shatter under
hard impact and manufacture of them had to be stopped until a
fix for this problem was found. The discovery that solved this
problem was celluloid. However, because of the problems with his
earlier billiard balls, acceptance of these celluloid billiard
balls did not come easily. However, this process did lead to the
discovery of Bakelite and cast-phenolic resins which are the
main components of billiard balls even to this day.
Then in 1892 William A. Spinks, a professional billiard player
from Chicago, began working with chemists on the components of
chalk. It was during one of his trips to Paris that he
discovered a chalk like no other. He was impressed with the
chalk's ability to grip during play and set out to invent a
chalk that could grip even more. Finally in 1897 he was granted
a patent for billiard chalk, which actually did not contain any
billiard chalk at all. It was made up entirely of silica and
axolite. This compound was crushed to fine powder and then air
floated to achieve just the right fineness.
The effect of the new "chalk" on the game would change billiards
forever. The grit actually took hold of the ball on impact in a
way that had never been seen before. It also solved the problem
of blackboard chalk which discolored the billiard cloth and even
rotted the fabric. The original color of this chalk was green
but eventually it was made in just about every color. This chalk
greatly improved the performance of the cue tip and literally
revolutionized the game itself.
In the next article in this series we'll take a look at cue
construction during the transformation years.
About the author:
Michael Russell
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