Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 246, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 November 1917 — MOST BRILLIANT PERFORMANCE OF HOPPE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

MOST BRILLIANT PERFORMANCE OF HOPPE

Unquestionably the most brilliant performance of William F. Hoppe, whose remarkable mastery of the ivory spheres lohg has. been the talk of the billiard world, was his astonishing defeat of Maurice Vignaux, the noted French expert, who had vanquished nearly all the other American players of renown. The match between the eighteen-year-old American boy and the veteran Frenchman took place at the Grand hotel, Paris, on January 15, 1906, and was won by the youngster by the decisive score of 500 to 323. When it is considered that the style of play was 181, the most diffimlt of all bulkline games, the victory of the boy was all the more remarkable. The fact that Hoppe’s average was 20 20-24, against 14 1-23 by Vignaux and that the victor made a high run of 93 and ran out with an unfinished break of 75, while the loser’s best run was 61, shows how completely the youth outclassed the older player. Vignaux Was Champion. Previous to this match Vignaux had beaten Schafer, Slosson and Sutton, and was the champion at eighteen, when Hoppe challenged for the honors. The French master and his friends were highly amused, for they had not been informed as to the ability of the little chap, who had discarded knickerbockers but a few years previously. Vignaux started off in the lead and played with the greatest confidence. The youngster performed with surprising skill and steadiness, but the onlookers were of the opinion that he would break down under the strain of the Frenchman’s progressive counting. At the end of the eleventh inning the figures were: Hoppe, 139; Vignaux, 164. In the twelfth, Hoppe, with a splendid masse, placed the spheres nicely

and ran a perfectly nursed 23, failiilg with an all-around shot to get outside the line. Vignaux, now on -his mettle, completed 47, this run being remarkable for a wonderful screw draw. Betting on Vignaux. When the interval came, with the score 266 to 288, in favor of Vignaux, there was a little betting on Vignaux at 5 to 4 in the French diviAon, but the Americans could not be drawn in at any price. L Recommencing, Hoppe scored only 2; Vignaux put together a moderate 4, leaving the balls well together. This although the little American had a narrow squeeze as a result of playing too gently at the eleventh stroke, he sailed ahead,, tying Vignaux when he had made 38. After putting together 51, Hoppe was ahead by 2 points only. After Vignaux had replied with 9, his breakdown being again a failure to get the balls out of balk, the game was in Hoppe’s hands, for in the five following breaks he made 219 to 64 compiled by Vignaux in his four innings. Runs 93 for Record. Hoppe’s 93 in the twenty-second inning was the record. It was made without a fluke. *’ The boy gave one of the grandest exhibitions of billiards imaginable. Time after time he had to stop until the applause ceased. When at the beginning of the twen-ty-fourth Inning, wanting 75 to win, Hoppe took his place at the table one could almost have heard a pin drop. In almost breathless silence broken only by the marker’s voice, he put on point after point, nurses, recalls and cushion carrows being faultlessly made. At 57 it looked as though he would break down, but with a four-cushion carrom he had the balls in close company and ran out.

WILLIE HOPPE, BILLIARD CHAMPION OF WORLD.