New England Candlepin Bowling

By Susan Mara Bregman and Mike Morin

Candlepin bowling is hard. So hard, in fact, that no one has ever bowled a perfect game. The pins are tall and skinny, the balls are small enough to fit in a player's hand, and the fallen pins are not cleared between rolls. Originating in Worcester, Massachusetts, in the late 19th century and played today mostly in New England and eastern Canada, the game has a rich and colorful history. In the days before automation, sure-footed pin boys manually reset the pins and returned the balls. A long-running, top-rated Boston television show regularly transformed unassuming candlepinners into regional celebrities. And the game has something called a Half Worcester. Author and photographer Susan Mara Bregman bowled at dozens of candlepin centers, combed through dusty archives, and interviewed industry insiders to create this affectionate look at one of America's quirkiest pastimes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
• Release date: Nov 2, 2020
• ISBN: 9781439671566

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INTRODUCTION

Ancient Egyptians and Romans did it. So did Henry VIII, Martin Luther, Babe Ruth, Rip Van Winkle, Fred Flintstone, and The Dude. It is a rite of passage for presidential candidates. Everybody bowls.

Tenpin is the most common version of the game in the United States, but in parts of New England and eastern Canada, bowling means candlepins. Both games use a ball to knock down 10 pins over 10 frames. But the similarities end there.

Tenpin bowling uses bottle-shaped pins and large balls with three finger holes. Bowlers have two chances per frame to knock down all 10 pins.

Candlepin bowling uses cylindrical pins that are tapered slightly at each end. The balls are smaller than tenpin balls, and they fit in a player’s hand. They do not have finger holes. Candlepin players have three turns per frame, and the downed pins are not cleared between rolls.

Candlepin bowling was invented in Worcester, Massachusetts, around 1880 and has not strayed far from its roots. Today, the game is played mostly in New England. Candlepin houses are concentrated in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine; a few can be found in Vermont. Canadians are also candlepin bowlers, and there are centers in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

Candlepin is one of four types of small-ball bowling in the United States and Canada. The other games are duckpins, rubber-band duckpins, and five pins. All were developed around the turn of the 20th century and are still played today.

Full disclosure: I grew up in New York, where tenpin rules. I discovered candlepins when I moved to Boston after college. I wish I could say it was love at first sight, but it was not. I played a game here or there, but for most of my adult life, I was oblivious to bowling in any of its variations.

But one night I got together with a couple of old friends, and we decided to go bowling. Once I laced up a pair of rental shoes and picked up one of those small balls, I was hooked. Much to my chagrin, I was not a good bowler—okay, I was terrible. Even when I tried to sneak in a few extra balls by not pressing the reset button when my turn was over, I could barely knock down any pins.

But that is the beauty of candlepin bowling. There is always room for improvement. A perfect score of 300 points—12 consecutive strikes—is not unknown in tenpin. But in more than a century of play, no one has ever rolled a perfect candlepin game. The highest recorded score in candlepin bowling is 245, which has been achieved only twice.

In fact, the true believers scoff at those who roll 300s in tenpin. With those big balls and fat pins, they say, anyone can achieve perfection with enough practice. The difficulty is a point of pride for candlepinners. A story in Sports Illustrated concurred. Indeed, that frustration may be the game’s true appeal, Douglas Campbell wrote. He was profiling Stasia Czernicki, the best woman candlepin bowler in the history of the game (and some say the best of either gender), but he spent some time pondering the appeal of those small balls. On the one hand it mixes well in the dour, Calvinist blood of purebred Yankees, he added. "And on the other it is the perfect metaphor for life in a mill town or in any dead-end