Pub Game Trophies & Medals - Pt.3

Medals and Trophies for pub games such as Darts, Skittles, and even Quoits are fairly common, in fact I come across far more of them than I'd ever want to buy. Every now and then I come across something a bit rarer though, like this enamelled roundel which would have been mounted on a trophy for the game of Rings.

Rings is a game I've yet to encounter outside of one or two specialist pub collections, nor would I unless I travelled to the Isle of Wight, Essex, or Ireland where the game is at its most popular. The Ventnor & District is the last remaining of two leagues on the Isle of Wight, the Essex branch of the game represented by a single league at the Silver Hall Social Club so far as I can tell. The real stronghold of the game though is in Ireland, where there are numerous leagues and a Ring-Board Academy to oversee competition. The image on this roundel represents the 15-hook version of Rings played in and around Ventnor (the Essex and Irish boards have 13 hooks), the aim being to hook small rubber rings, scoring in the manner of a Darts game.

These are fairly typical Darts fob medals of the mid-late 20th century. The one above features a simple enamelled image of a Dartboard, the one below attractively embellished with a set of silver Darts. The above medal is made from a base metal rather than silver so there's no hallmark to date it. Unfortunately it carries no engraving on the back either, so there's no clue as to who it was awarded to, or for what competition. I've also failed, as yet, to discover which 'Works Social Club' in Nottingham this league operated from, but presumably it was a large one to sustain what appears to have been a significant in-house competition.

By contrast, this hallmarked silver example by James Fenton of Birmingham, is a textbook example of what I hope to find on the back of all fob medals. The team from the Junction Arms, Upper Holloway in London were clearly the league winners of the St Dunstans Darts League in 1950. This was a London based league that had a strong association with the St Dunstans War Veterans charity. Touring exhibition matches by the famous St Dunstans Four helped fund the leagues charitable work, and a successor to this league continues today in the form of the Salisbury & District Darts League which supports the charity Wiltshire Sight. The Junction Arms is also still going strong, though under the name of the Oak & Pastor these days.

Quoits, as mentioned previously in this short series, was a hugely popular mens sport, played and spectated throughout the whole country at the time this medal was awarded in 1919. Perhaps hard to believe given that Quoits today has shrunk to a regional game that many people may never even have heard of let alone seen played, restricted as it is to just a handful of leagues in England, Scotland, and Wales. Needless to say, London isn't one of these regions, but it's an indication of just how widespread the game was at the time that there would have been separate associations managing the game for several different areas of the capital. This medal was made by JA Wylie & Co of Birmingham (and London), and was awarded to the League Championship Runner(s)-up.

I started this series of posts with a rather withering appraisal of the trophies and medals on offer to the winners of pub games leagues these days, and I'll finish with a fairly typical example of what's on offer. This hideously ostentatious trophy for Northamptonshire Table Skittles is in fact 35 years old, so practically 'vintage' in age. Nevertheless it's a good example of the cheap plastic and glitz that passes for 'silverware' today, a trophy that may look impressive on the trophy table at presentation evenings, but wouldn't look out of place at a fairground to be honest! Quite what the trophy shop were thinking when they ordered in these trophies is hard to guess, probably no further than the bottom line I'd imagine. Sadly this is often all that's available for cash-strapped leagues, though you'd think that a simple wooden plaque would be a better reward, and no more expensive. I'm certainly glad that I received a small cash prize as cup runner-up rather than one of these abominations. Oh for the days of silver fob medals! The Rushden & District Licensed Victuallers Association Skittles League is probably the forerunner of the current Rushden & District Skittles League.

Pub Game Trophies & Medals - Pt.2

Alley skittles, as played in the West Country and much of Southern England and Wales, is perhaps the most popular of all regional and local pub games played today. In fact it's always been a popular game, such that skittles in all its myriad forms would have been ubiquitous in pubs and clubs throughout the country at one time. As such, winners medals and other silverware for the game are very common, perhaps second only in number to the '(inter)national' game of Darts. Common enough then, and for the most part the images used on these medals and trophies are quite similar in design, usually a man, delivering a ball down an alley at a set of skittle pins.

This slightly over-polished base-metal disc would have originally been mounted on a shield or trophy, so the lack of league and winners details (and possibly hallmark) that you'd expect to find on a medal makes it difficult to date. The main interest for me is that the image depicts a woman in the act of Skittles play, something I've rarely seen on a medal, trophy or shield for traditional pub games. Which is not to say that 'silverware' for women's teams and leagues doesn't exist, it's just that the images depicted are usually either standard depictions of men at play, or a genderless representation of the game itself such as a Dartboard, Cards, or Dominoes.

Now I'm certainly no expert on period dress, but the woman depicted here seems to come from another time altogether, perhaps a vintage representation of the game at the very least. The pins are slightly problematic for skittles, looking as they do more like a set for 10-pin bowling than our native 9 pin skittles. However, I've seen more than enough genuinely old skittle pins to know that they come in all shapes and sizes, indeed the Hereford Leagues have been using re-purposed bowling pins like these for many years. It is of course worth reiterating that the games depicted on these medals and trophies don't necessarily reflect the one that it was awarded for. But women have been participating in traditional games at the pub for many years, so it's nice to see their gender represented correctly on the silverware for a change.

There's perhaps no better indication of just how popular and widespread the game of Steel Quoits was in the late 19th and early 20th century than the existence of medals like this one. Silverware for Football and Cricket is perhaps the most common of all 'sporting' fob medals, but this one is slightly unusual in that it indicates the Dewsbury & Savile Cricket & Football Club had a Quoits Section alongside the more familiar national sports played at the club.

Around the time this Fattorini & Sons medal was made, Quoits was played throughout the country, and in some areas would have been the equal of Football for spectator interest, if not actual participation. Quoits Pitches and the larger Quoits Fields suitable for spectating the sport were numerous and often associated with pubs, but they were also an important aspect of multi-discipline sports clubs like this one. The Dewsbury & Savile Club eventually merged with Whitley Lower Cricket Club, later to become the Hopton Mills Cricket Club. The old ground was surrendered to the council, though it's doubtful whether the Quoits Pitch still existed at this time as the game went into rapid decline in the post-war years. There's a bit about the famous old Cricket Club online, not so much about the Football, and needless to say there's nothing much at all about the Quoits Section!

In 1935 when this medal by Thomas Fattorini Ltd of Birmingham was presented, it would have been standard practice for skittles leagues to seek, or be offered sponsorship from local brewers. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement given the thirsty custom a thriving skittles league would have brought to their pubs. Georges Brewery (latterly part of the Courage, Barclay and Simonds group) was a Bristol based brewing concern, and therefore the game on this medal is correctly represented as alley skittles, a game which is still popular throughout the West Country and beyond.

Small Bore or Miniature Rifle Shooting is one of those sports that flies well below the radar for most of us. Yet this too was very popular from around the war years as both a recreational pastime and a way of improving shooting proficiency in the civilian population at a time of conflict. That this branch of shooting should have found a natural home in the pub might seem odd, and yet entirely unsurprising given it was targeted at the working classes, and for many the pub, clubs, and the village hall were the only indoor venues available to shoot over a range of 15-25 yards. The sport is still practiced at the pub, often making use of the Skittle Alley.

This 'white-metal' medallion is slightly larger than a typical fob medal, and originally had a chain ring screwed into the top edge. So a true 'medal' to be worn around the neck if so desired. Made by Pinches of London, a highly regarded medallist established in 1840, now part of the Franklin Mint. From the position of the gentleman cueing at the table, there's the suggestion of three balls on the table in this image. Possibly deliberate given that the medal is probably for the earlier 3-ball game of Billards rather than Snooker.

The 'pushing' and 'shoving' games rarely seem to feature on fob medals or trophies. Perhaps for most players, these bar-room games were regarded as more of an afternoon pleasure than serious competition, though it's certainly true that there were numerous leagues for the games of Shove Ha'penny and Pushpenny throughout the 20th century, a handful of which survive to this day. This is the closest I've managed to acquire of this once very popular game, a slightly novel spinning medal that would have originally been mounted atop a trophy of some sort. We might cautiously conclude from the image that this was for the rarer 3-coin game of Pushpenny rather than the 5-coin game Shove Ha'penny.

A Compendium of Pub Games Images - Pt. 21

The Bagatelle Table shown here has been squeezed into a room adjoining the main bar of the Royal Oak at Hoole in Chester. Hoole is a small village suburb of Chester, around 15 minutes walk out from the town centre, and very convenient for arrivals at the nearby rail station.

The Royal Oak is a friendly multi-room locals pub, a venue for conversation, good beer, and playing the local speciality of Bagatelle. The pub fields a team in the Chester & District Bagatelle League.

It's perhaps hard for us to appreciate just how widely played and popular the game of Quoits was in the pre and post-war years. Despite being played on Quoits Fields at pubs, clubs, and public recreation grounds the length and breadth of the country, little now remains to remind us of its importance as a game to the mostly working class men who played it. The Quoits Beds themselves are mostly all gone, and the trophies and records of the game have not endured in the same way that other pub and club games such as skittles have. Which is not to say that the game has entirely died out, indeed there are still several active, albeit much smaller leagues operating in parts of Anglia, Scotland, Wales, and the north of England.

A good indication of how widespread and popular the game of Quoits once was can be seen in the images above and below. This magnificent silver Boss, illustrating a Quoits game in progress, sits at the centre of a substantial trophy shield which acknowledges national Quoiting success in the small Rutland village of Ketton. Quoits was a very popular game in Rutland, no less so in Ketton which was home to at least four quoiting beds, and most impressive of all, a three times All England Champion in local cement works foreman Arthur Knox. The full shield, presented by the Peterborough & District Quoiting League, can be seen on the right of the team photograph below, and is now proudly displayed at the Ketton Sports & Social Club.

The last remaining Quoits Bed in the village was within the grounds of the club but is now tarmac'd over as part of the car park. The club is still very active within the village, with most modern games represented, including Bowls, Cribbage, Darts, Dominoes, and Rutlands current favourite throwing game, Pétanque.

The 'Skittle Room' at Leicesters Durham Ox is in truth more of a covered courtyard which serves the double function of a very well appointed smoking shelter. The kind of skittles played here is the thoroughly local Leicester version of Table Skittles, with its thinner pins, smaller cheeses, and slightly different table geometry to the better known Northamptonshire game. I'm not sure how often the table gets used these days, certainly the pub no longer fields a team in any of the Leicester Leagues, but it's good to see such a relative rarity of pub gaming survive in such good shape.

The pub itself is located in an area of the town which has been hit hard by changing demographics, and is one of the last of its type on this side of the city centre (see also the nearby Bridle Lane Tavern). The interior of the pub is very well maintained, and attracts a good local crowd for televised sport, Pool and Darts.

The Plough, Little Downham, Cambridgeshire

At first glance, the Grade II listed Plough might appear to be the kind of village local which has been largely untouched by the passage of time. The interior of the pub is certainly 'unspoilt' and thoroughly traditional in appearance, but the fact is the Plough will have seen many changes over the years. Any village institution which has managed to weather more than a hundred years of changing customer taste, and an occasional change of ownership, simply has to change or face almost inevitable decline. It all comes down to how sensitively that change is managed whether a pub can juggle the often conflicting goals of tradition and staying 'on-trend' as it were. The Plough succeeds where many similar village pubs have failed in this regard, indeed I think you'd have to be a regular of long-standing to see the joins at all.

Perhaps the most significant change at the Plough would have been when the front Tap Room (see image below) was extended into what was originally the cellar (image above). I wonder how much grumbling emanated from the locals when this idea was first mooted, though it's hard to imagine how the pub would have survived to this day without the subsequent doubling of trading space which resulted.

The history of the Plough is written large on the walls of the pub, a fascinating photographic journey through several generations of locals, licensees, and their many sporting and gaming pursuits. Currently, it's Shooting which seems to plays a large part in the activities of both the village and the pub, though Darts and Dominoes are also popular if the stack of Cribbage Boards and Tiles seen below are anything to go by.

The Plough of the 21st century remains thoroughly relevant to both villagers and visitors, with an excellent reputation for beer, cider, and Thai food.

This fabulous image is reproduced with the kind permission of John Clarke of the Little Downham Community Archive, and features George Green in front of the Pitch Penny bench in the bar of the Plough sometime around the 1940's or 50's. Sadly, as with the vast majority of pubs where this simple bar-room game was once played, the bench is now long gone and the game all-but forgotten. A good example of a Pitch Penny bench still in use can be found at the Jackson Stops Inn, Rutland, and another fine bench at The Bull in Essex is featured on the Pints & Pubs blog.

A set of Steel Quoits sit rusting by the stove. The game of Quoits was once played throughout the country, and still clings on as a league game in nearby Ipswich. Note the Yard of Ale behind, a pub game which has never to my knowledge been played at league level! The trophies are for Shooting.

The last date for the winner of the Little Downham Conker Championship appears to be around the mid 90's. Sadly, it doesn't take much for a village tradition like this to come to an untimely end, or for a defunct tradition to be successfully re-booted for that matter!

 

This photograph, which hangs above the stove in the bar, shows a game of Dwyle Flunking (or Flonking) in progress on the green opposite the Plough. Perhaps the least said about this particular drinking game the better, since as traditions go this one has the distinct whiff of pastiche about it. A raucous amalgamation of Morris Dancing and school playground game, it is widely believed that this Suffolk pastime was invented in the 1960's, during the height of interest in all things Goon-ish or Monty Python-esque. The game is listed amongst many other examples of British eccentricity on Montegue Blister's Strange Games blog.