Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 22, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 December 1900 — The Coming Old Men’s Bowling Match [ARTICLE]

The Coming Old Men’s Bowling Match

Mention has heretofore been made of the fact that a bowliDg club had accepted the challenge of the Rensselaer ci£b to match W. N. Jones against fßy player over 50 years. Mondafib Times-Herald contains the picture* of Chicago’s champion together with the following descriptive matter. E. M. Hoyt, a veteran ten--pin bowler, who has played the game from its earliest days in Chicago, is open to meet any player in the country over 60 years of age. In the old dajs when Hannah & Hogg put in their alleys in Madi--son street Hoyt took to the game. In those daj s the alleys were three feet wide and forty feet long, and the. balls ranged from ten to twelve inohes in circumference. Soon afterward the Garden City alleys were laid in a downtown basement, slate being used for the bed. On. these alleys Hoyt soon gained *some degree of prominence. Later the Chicago Bowling League was organized, and Hoyt was one of the prime movers in its creation, and his team, the West End, landed the championship in the first annual tournament on Kinsley’s alleys. Mr. Hoyt’s delivery is a slow curved three-quarter center ball. The nature of his business prevents his joining any city league, but on Saturday afternoon he sometimes bowls with the experts in the City Club games, and he gives the younger men a hard rub. Mr. Hoyt is doubtless the best bowler of his years in the city, and averages ordinarily 170 or over. He is a bit erratic, sometimes rolling 200 and then rolling only 150. He is always regarded as a dangerous opponent by bowlers, however good, chiefly on account of his faculty of seeming never to tire. Hoyt’s appearance would not indicate that he was at all devoted to athletics of any kind, but be attributes his good health and soundness of physique primarily to the preservative powers of bowling. It is possible a match may be arranged between Mr. Hoyt and W. N. Joneß of Rensselaer, Ind. Mr. Jones is 69 years of age and is open to play any man over 60 on alleys in Rensselaer. George A. Strickfaden, manager for Jones, has already sent Jones’ challenge to Chicago. A reply has been sent, proposing that the match be played in Chicago on neutral alleys, for $25, four games out of seven or total pins to count, and Mr. Hoyt has deposited $lO as a forfeit to bind the ma&cb. No reply has yet been received from Rensselaer. /