[Ads-l] notes on "bingo"

Tue Jun 21 17:48:18 UTC 2022

Interesting.  Stephen Carter is a professor at my school.

Fred Shapiro

________________________________
From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2022 12:08 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Subject: notes on "bingo"

>From Stephen L. Carter, "Why Supreme Court Watchers Are Making Bingo Jokes"
(June 18, 2022), about the SCOTUS case Ysleta Del Sur Pueblo v. Texas,
which "turned on whether the gaming machines operated by a tribe on its
lands constituted a version of bingo":

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The OED calls the origin of this sense of the word 'obscure' and attests
the usage only to 1936. Actually, it’s older. An 1893 article in a Nebraska
newspaper refers to bingo as an 'old reliable' game that is 'very popular'
among ladies. Other citations around the same time confirm that by the end
of the 19th century, the game had been around for a while.
---

Here's the 1893 article in question:

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Cuming County Advertiser (West Point, Neb.), Jan. 17 1893, p. 1, col. 2
A farewell party was given at Krause's Hall last Friday evening... The
program for the evening was: 1st. High Five in which forty people played;
2nd. the old reliable "Bingo," a game very popular among the W.P. ladies,
or, taking the words of Pauline "the game among games." The circle
consisted of thirty couples; 3rd the game which the boys are particularly
"stuck" on, and especially when they are in the majority is "Miller." We
had another siege of "Bingo" after "Miller" much to the displeasure of the
boys, but the girls were in the majority and so what they said was a go.
---

Carter is surely wrong that the 1893 article has anything to do with the
later game of chance (besides the name). Rather, the article appears to
describe a late 19th-century children's game involving rings of boys and
girls singing the folk song "Bingo Was His Name-O." There was also a more
grown-up version played at picnics and other social outings, sometimes
involving kissing. See descriptions here:

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This "bingo" game was popular early on in Pennsylvania -- the earliest
examples I've found date to 1877 (often mentioned alongside a similar game
called "copenhagen"):

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Harrisburg (Pa.) Telegraph, Aug. 6, 1877, p. 1, col. 2
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Philadelphia Times, Aug. 28, 1877, p. 4, col. 3
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Lebanon (Pa.) Daily News, Sep. 10, 1877, p. 1, col. 6
---

As for the game of chance, Barry Popik and Fred Shapiro have previously
shared citations going back to 1923.

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I've managed to antedate it further to Aug. 1922, when the game was
evidently first popularized as a concession at carnivals, often using
kernels of corn as markers (hence also known as "the corn game").

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The Billboard, Aug. 19, 1922, p. 100, col. 1
"Pittsburg," by Lucile Dawson-Rex
Louis and Mrs. Ellis, well-known concessioners, left the Dodson & Cherry
Shows at New Kensington, Pa., and took their Bingo game over to the West
Pennsylvania Volunteer Firemen's Convention celebration at West Homestead,
Pa. They bought out the share of Chas. Jessup and now own the concession
alone.
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The Billboard, Sep. 2, 1922, p. 86 (advt.)
BINGO - CORN GAME - BINGO
Over 300 sold to successful operators, with demand growing each week. BINGO
is easy to operate, because of its simplicity, never failing to get a play,
and is so arranged that with the detailed instructions I send you success
is sure. Any sizes prizes can be used, and is as fast as Wheel. BINGO Cards
are of 6-ply glazed, two color, 8x10. Including tags, all is complete.
Thirty-five-player layouts..$5.00 Seventy-player layouts..$10.00
Barnes, 1356 N. LaSalle St., Chicago, Ill.
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Florence (Kans.) Bulletin, Sep. 7, 1922, p. 1, col. 5
The car is on display all the time on a truck among the concessions between
Fourth and Fifth streets, and a Bingo game has added much interest to this
feature.
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More examples clipped here:
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As later described in articles in the Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph, Hugh J.
Ward of Hazelwood, Pa. is credited with taking an earlier version of the
game (sometimes called "keeno," "lotto," or -- in the UK and Canada --
"housey-housey"), giving it new rules and christening it "bingo."

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Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph, Nov. 22, 1935, p. 5
"Pittsburgher Invented Bingo from Old Game"
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Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph, Dec. 12, 1939, p. 11
"Canada's Housey-Housey Introduced Here as Bingo"
---

Here's one common origin story:

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"Bingo!" by Alison Hall, Dec. 23, 2019
Hugh J. Ward began running the game at carnivals in Pittsburgh and around
western Pennsylvania in the early 1920s. Its popularity as a carnival game
spread, and in 1929, toy merchandiser Edwin Lowe came across the game at a
traveling carnival in Atlanta. The game followed Ward’s rules, but they
called it Beano because they used dried beans as markers.
Lowe took the game back to New York with him, and his friends found it just
as fascinating as the carnival-goers had. He began to operate games in New
York using the same equipment as the traveling carnival did.
With Bingo’s popularity booming, Ward developed a home version of the game.
He registered a copyright for the rulebook “Bingo” in 1933 and described it
as “Bingo, a modern game adapted to commercial use, to advertise
merchandise and to stimulate sales.” He did not, however, renew the
copyright.
---

In some versions of the story, Edwin Lowe brought "Beano" to New York and
supposedly renamed it "Bingo" when "one lady was so excited at winning that
she called out 'Bingo' instead of 'Beano'":

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It's clear that the game was called "bingo" long before Lowe got to it, so
perhaps he told that story as a way to claim ownership of the name for
trademark purposes. Assuming Hugh J. Ward really did give it the name, he
could have been inspired by the earlier "bingo" game that he would have
known from growing up in western Pennsylvania. (Ward is quoted in the 1939
Sun-Telegraph article as saying, "'Bingo' was a popular phrase in those
days, and so we adopted that.")

--bgz

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