In with the Old ...

[ericrm305]

What an excellent topic for a game with the best looking equipment around. I'd like to start off this topic (I can't believe it's already been a week and nobody's put up anything. If it were Show and Tell Fishing we'd already have 6 or 7 sub categories) with what I think is the oldest board I've ever seen barring Wettlaufer's at the SchneiderHaus and this year's WCC. The oldest one I've played on then anyway.
The story is that I was driving back to Toronto from Hamilton and there's a Value Village on the way. This is where I started looking for old boards for the students at my school. I never found any at that time and once you buy a few regulation boards with the bigger disks nobody wants to play on the smaller ones. I was going to give the V.V. a miss this time but I almost heard a little voice whimpering. "Don't leave me here to get busted into kindling. " So I went in and wandered around, didn't see much of anything and thought I'm an idiot for having a hunch about a board. ...And then I look down on a shelf in the furniture and 'things-made-of-wood' section, in amongst the crutches and those boxes you buy whisky in when you plan to give it as a present, and tucked in there is one big, old decrepit looking board.
"Eureka! ...maybe?" I pick it up and give it a good look:the deck varnish is pretty worn down in spots and the start line is drawn about 2.5 inches in from the edge. The pegs are all there but they are like nails with no heads. The twenty hole is more like a vortex than a hole, so worn along the edge it looks like its been beveled. I think it might be homemade and I think maybe it won't make it to my home. I flip it over and see lots of spider webs hmmm, attic? garage? buried in the basement? There's a name scribbled on the back in an old old hand back from when people were still taught penmanship. 'Gladys Nevills'. Now that I have a name to go with the board I think. "Let's find out what they want for it, the deck is a pretty decent chunk of wood, a half inch thick at least. I find a kid who's working there. He eyeballs the spider webs sort of frowns and says "How about fi--" "I'll take it!" I cut in. "I better just check" he says and off he goes with it and comes back with a sticker (thank goodness, not plastered on the upside deck) and away I go. Five bucks!
After I got 'Gladys' home and checked out Wayne Kelly's archive, I found out that what I almost left behind, as Crokbait for curious thrillseekers rooting around for little know pastimes to take home and become enthralled by, was actually one of T.Eaton's finest. I'm sure of it - painted yellow lines, quadrant lines drawn only half way through the five circle, a baseline wide enough to accomodate a large disc (and both your elbows). The one weakness mentioned was its pegs, true enough they don't look like much, but they are all still there, only one is the slightest bit wobbly but it's not coming out.

19th century ... Wow!

But can she still be played? Darned if after putting down some Mother's Carnauba car wax and buffing it up she was performing as good as ... a pretty darn good crokinole board. She could probably use some of the 35 mm size disks, or else I'd love to get a hold of some of those inch high - inch and half across blocks that you see with those MB Ross boards. You aren't guaranteed a twenty every time but it's easier than on quite a few others I've played. However it's not your boring "Oh yeah, ho-hum, were-my-eyes-open-on-that-one?" type of twenty (not that I've ever been blessed enough to be that blase with my twenties) It's actually a lot fun to watch the discs plop into , pirouette and sluice around the centre hole, they really do, like no other board I've seen.

(Is this getting too Freudian?)

So that's my story (don't worry, it's not over, that's not the only one, I have a few more) but I'm sure many of you have better ones and now that I've relieved you all of the onus of being the first, let's hear some real stories about boards that make you smile and nod your head and say. "It's great to be alive and flicking. And I owe it all to this board."
By contrast all I have for now is the bargain hunter's satisfaction of having spirited out of the Value Village a board worth maybe between $150 - $650! What distinguishes the high priced from the low? hmmm, elm and basswood? I'd better track down a wood guy. What else? "Original owner’s name written on back: “Archie Cobban" Really??? Now we are getting somewhere - Archie meet Gladys! (Jackpot, maybe?) It is a bit more worn on the baseline in the middle and at the quad line intersections than Mr Kelly's pics show. Especially in one quad. Maybe that was Gladys' favourite practicing quarter? Who knows? But no matter what, for five bucks! it Pings my Peg!

I hope the pictures do 'Gladys'
justice.

By the way, would anybody happen to know anything al all about a 'Gladys Nevills'?

[flicksandknips]

..after putting down some Mother's Carnauba car wax and buffing it up she was performing as good as ... a pretty darn good crokinole board.

So even if the surface has been significantly worn (varnish worn through in some spots, chips on board), you can apply this wax and make it virtually smooth again? Could you give me specific advice about how to do this? I've been thinking of picking up some of this wax; where would you find it (multiple options would be helpful as Sask can be pretty sparse for stores)?

I really like your story. You've inspired me to search even harder in my expeditions to Value Villiage and old antique shops. I'll let you know if I find anything...

[ericrm305]

Hi Paul,
thanks, I'm glad you liked the story. And yes, the waxing made a huge difference taking the board from a surface that you practically needed to apply a full-force-flick to get contact with a disc on the other side of the pins (otherwise you'd probably have your shot stop short of the target) to one where you could fine tune your shots and plan a strategy that had some chance of working out in reality. I think maybe the best way to explain how I waxed this board is to do another 'show and tell' with pictures. I hope to have some time next week to maybe do this. Maybe 'ips and techniques' would be the best place to put this story though.

Thanks for your replies to my other emails too, it's great to get a response. I hope to answer the rest very soon and put the disc-ussion back in your quadrant. (euh, 'disc-ussion'? That's stretching it eh?)

Moving on to things in better taste, I really like your blogsite. Your club seems very laidback. I wish I lived nearer to Caronport. Actually I always thought it would be fun to tell strangers that I came from a place with a name like 'Moose Jaw' but I was sure that I'd end up telling it to someone from Saskatchewan and they'd just say - "Oh yeah, where'd you go to high school?" hmmm, awkward. However, I think I now may be ready for that possibility - I'll just say: "...I don't like to talk about it. Do you play crokinole, by any chance?"

Are you going to post some pictures of some action in the Tearoom? I'm curious to see what the place looks like. You can see where the Toronto club played if you go to the blog:

http://torontocrokinoleclub.blogspot.com

It's actually a lot better lit than it looks. I took Halloween pictures at night with that camera and I had the ISO cranked way up. So the pictures were a bit grainy and washed out and to compensate I boosted the contrast and saturation.

Next meeting is in a pub called the Ferret and Firkin Nov. 25 7:00 pm.

Cheers,

Eric

[flicksandknips]

Since responding to your initial post, I got a hold of some mother's car wax. I think it makes a difference! I had read something about using it on another site and had since forgot, so I appreciated your story and how it had helped an old board find new play.

Thanks for the compliment by the way. Our club is low key indeed. I don't have any pictures yet, mostly because attendance wasn't extremely high and I ended up playing throughout the night. Also, the room is being renovated and we have yet to get the new light fixtures installed!

Our community is basically built around college life; the sudden changes in attendance are often due to exams, papers, or just being wiped out from the week. So sometimes numbers are high and other times we have a great time with 6 or so people. I'm happy either way because it means that word is getting out there and people are getting exposure to the game.

I'll be sure to get some pictures up on our blog sometime. Hey, speaking of blogs, do you know of any other club sites for crokinole? Anything off the radar? I'd appreciate others' input if you're aware of anything out there.