OK it is story time... I started playing pool in 1959. You were supposed to be 15 to get in the local pool hall but I was a big kid and if you did not act up too much and you had some change to spare, you could sneak in during the daylight hours. The pool hall was in the basement of a clothing store downtown. There was an old Rock-Ola nickel Juke box, a nickel pinball machine, a Coke machine that you opened the top like a cooler, put a nickel in and had to slide the bottles from the top through a maze of stainless bars, and I think there were about twelve 9X5 foot antique pool tables, all with leather open pockets, and three piece slates... they were beautiful! There was also a two lane bowling set up with manual pin set but I do not remember it ever in operation. Above each pool table there was a wire to keep score for 25 ball. The wire was strung with what I still think were Faro Case Keepers to keep score. All the balls on the tables were the CLAY DART balls shown in your link. Signs on the walls set the rules; no swearing, no spitting, and no gambling but it was very common for a money game on tables one & two. The proprieter's name was Albert Swartz, a old stocky guy that I remember well had lost his BIRD finger at the knuckle on his left hand, but still made a perfect bridge and played pool very well when he had the time to play. Players would end the game they were playing and slap a nickel on the rail and call out. "Rack 'em Albert!" On command Albert would come over to your table and rack the balls, collect your nickel and put it in a belt coin changer, or make change for you. I can remember in the 60s, a bowling alley in town put two new 25 cent "coin op" tables in. All the pool shooters laughed at the 4X8 tables and we all thought, this will never catch on. But it was soon clear that playing simple 8 Ball on a smaller table was easier than the 5X9 tables and there was money to be made. I played a lot of pool for money in the 60s and 70s. I learned the game of Poker at the age of seven or at least I knew the values of the hands in 1957 and played for Baseball Cards and Comic books. My older brother was a Math Wiz and we played poker with the rich kids accross the street. I can remember carrying two boxes of baseball cards home one day and my brother saying, "Whatever happens... Do not tell MOM how we got these!" I must have forgot because when she asked, "how did you boys get all these baseball card?" I told her the truth... about 50 pounds of 50s baseball cards went to the city dump that same day. Sortly after I learned how to DUMMY UP! It was all so much simpler back then.