Snooker Gallery

The home of snooker - The Ottacamund Club, Southern India

Playing snooker at the Ootacamund Club, Ootacamund (known as Snooty Ooty) in the Nilgiri Hills, Tamil Nadu, Southern India, where snooker originated on the billiard tables during the Raj. Snooker was invented in 1875 by army officer Neville Francis Fitzgerald Chamberlain. Date: 1992

© Philip Dunn / Mary Evans Picture Library

Billiards, Chamberlain, Club, Cue, Cues, District, Dunn, Fitzgerald, Francis, Game, Games, Hills, India, Nadu, Neville, Nilgiri, Nilgiris, Ootacamund, Ooty, Ootycamund, Philip, Snooker, Snooty, Table, Tamil

Players cigarettes advertisement by H. M. Bateman

Misunderstood - Marker: "Send up some more PLAYERS please!" Advertisement for Players Navy Cut cigarettes by the great C20th cartoonist H.M. Bateman in which some rather alarmed billiards players misconstrue the marker's request for more players (he means cigarettes of course). Date: 1925

© Illustrated London News Ltd/Mary Evans

Advert, Advertisement, Advertisements, Advertising, Adverts, Amusing, Aug17, Bateman, Billiards, Cartoon, Cartoons, Cigarette, Cigarettes, Confused, Confusion, Cue, Funny, Game, Henry, Hm, Humorous, Humour, Match, Mayo, Requesting, Smoking, Snooker, Table, Telephone

Thurstons Billiards House, Leicester Square - Bombed - 1940

The bombed out remains of Thurston's Billiard House on Leicester Square during the Blitz on London, WWII. The corner building was hit by a parachute mine at 3:30am on 16th October 1940. One of the player name plates being examined is that of the legendary British professional snooker and English billiards player Joe Davis (1901-1978). Thurstons was completely destroyed and several taxis parked outside were wrecked. Heavy debris fell into Panton Street, blocking it. Other name plates of top Billards players (pictured here) include: Horace Lindrum, Melbourne Inman, Walter Donaldson, Fred Davis and Sidney Smith. Date: 1940

© Mary Evans / Grenville Collins Postcard Collection