By Mark Falco
The origins of bingo, as
with most games, is shrouded in the mists of history. However, we can trace the
idea back to the 1500's where the Italians invented a lottery game to be played
'en masse' rather like Bingo is today. "Lo Giuoco del Lotto d'Italia"
was the very first state run lottery which proved to be so popular it is still
played today.
Perhaps closer to the
game we know today however is the French game of "Le Lotto" which was
derived from the Italian counterpart. This game was very popular with French
noblemen during the 18th century. This game involved a caller drawing out
wooden discs numbers from one to ninety from a bag and calling them out to the
players. Each player had a game board divided into nine rows and three columns
of numbers and the winner would be the person to mark off all the numbers in
one row.
Later versions of the Le
Lotto appeared in Germany but this time, it was used not for gambling purposes
but rather to teach children their times tables. Today, more of the same can be
found on the children's games market including such things as spelling bingo
with, of course, all of the gambling elements removed.
However, the first
example of bingo in its modern form appeared during the late 1920's when a New
York toy salesman stumbled upon an addictive fairground game and had a
brainwave. Edwin S. Lowe came across the game of "Beano" at a
carnival in Georgia. The players at this game had wooden cards full of numbers
and a set of dried beans. Every time the caller drew out a number they would
cover it up with a bean, the winner being the one to mark off all the numbers
in a straight line either diagonally, horizontally or vertically. So popular
was this game that Lowe never actually got a chance to play but the idea of
marketing this to the mass market was formed right there and then.
Hurrying back to New
York he quickly made his own replica of the carnival game and invited friends
over to play at a specially organized party. It was just as popular there in
his apartment to the point where one member got so excited that she stumbled
over the call of "Beano!" To signify she had won and shouted out
"BINGO!" instead. The name stuck and when Lowe produced the first
commercial version of the game retailing for just $1 that's the name it was
marketed with.
Bingo of course never
stayed as a parlour game but soon made it's way into being a large multi-player
social gambling event we see today. How it got that way is, unlikely as it
sounds, due in large part to the efforts of a Pensylvanian priest! The priest
needed to find a fundraising event for his church and saw the game of bingo as
being the ideal way to do it. He set up large-scale bingo game events with
hundreds of players instead of the handful the original game had been designed
for and the idea really took off.
Unfortunately, each game
now had tens of winners instead of a few so he commissioned a mathematician to
create cards with 6000 unique number combinations, a task which took several
months by hand as there were no computers to help back then. Once finished however
the game of bingo really took off in its modern form to the point where in
1934, just a few years after bingo first hit the mass market, there was over
10,000 games being played per week across America. Now of course, bingo is a
multi-million dollar industry across the world and can be played online 24
hours a day if it takes your fancy.
About the Author
Mark Falco is the
webmaster and owner of A Penny Earned, a UK shopping site and rewards
site which lists Free Bingo, Online Games and Free
Lotteries amongst other free and
fun stuff online.
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