Lunch with Don “The Cincinnati Kid” Willis By Dick Moecia

    I was at a class recently when the instructor directed those in attendance, as an ice breaker, to tell the class which two people they would like to have lunch with if given the chance, and why. The people could be dead or alive. These little exercises are generally meaningless. Their intent is to give each member of the class an opportunity to come out of their shell to center stage, if not for just a brief moment in time, so they are less reluctant to participate in class later on. Well, I was sitting in the back and after everyone else had taken their turn, I had what I thought was the perfect answer - at least the two people with whom I would most like to dine. I told the class Jesus Christ, of course, and I was surprised nobody else picked Him. Could you imagine the questions one would ask Him? For example, Jesus, how did you part the Red Sea? A little levity folks ... tantamount to John Belushi’s line in Animal House ... “Did the Americans give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? The class laughed and unanimously agreed that Jesus was the best choice of the day. However, the instructor reminded me that I still had one more selection. Who would it be? I told the class that I had really given it a lot of thought, and without a doubt, that person would be Don “The Cincinnati Kid” Willis. The class looked dumbfounded - wondering who is this Don Willis guy, so I explained.

    I didn’t get to meet Willis until he was years past his prime. It was in 1974, at the Canton Jewish Center, as an international music festival was held, and I was with my college sweetheart. It was one of those nights you never forget. There were hundreds of dance enthusiasts in the main ballroom as remnants of Glenn Miller and the big band sounds provided reason for couples to practice traditional dance. In a smaller room to the side, the Paul Antonneli Band entertained with a Vegas style show while still yet in another room, hundreds of tomorrow’s future danced or watched as a local make-good group played ‘Psychedelic Soul’ for anyone who would care to listen. But in the lobby were about one hundred or so onlookers crowding over one another like ducks in a park, lunging for a lone piece of bread as it is tossed by a good hearted sole. It was Mr. Don Willis displaying various card tricks. Before the crowd realized they would eventually tire and listen to music of their choice, Willis instinctively changed the game to regrasp their attention. Willis owned this crowd and he knew it for he was the master puppeteer and his cards were the strings.  

    A colorful sports figure, Don captivated the puppet crowd for hours with stories and trivia. He had a sharp mind. He could list all states and capitals in three minutes; all capitals of the world; the 130 largest cities in the country; the 71 enshrinees in the Pro Football Hall of Fame (at that time) and Heisman trophy winners in chronological order! He would then continue with more card games as a closed circuit television assisted those who were, unfortunately, too far back to see. 

    He worked the crowd with a story, preceding it by saying, "Here's a good story." Willis begins, "One time a fellow in Chicago asked me how good the Eufaula Kid was. I said I don't know. I'd never seen him play." The guy said, "You beat him, didn't you?" I said, "I did but I did all the shooting and didn't see him play." Willis on describing Lefty Burton. "Frank 'Lefty' Burton was probably the fastest good player that ever lived, Willis said." "One time playing nine ball, he shot the eight and the nine in, and the seven hung up. That's fast."

    The class was most interested so later during the break, I entertained many of them with more information about him. The term “legendary” should not be used loosely for if it were it would quickly lose its meaning. For example, Babe Ruth is legendary. Despite the many outstanding baseball players, active and retired, who have ever stepped foot on a field, I know of no other player who owns the title “legendary” as does Ruth. There are some other former greats who rent the title, but Ruth owns it. Willis was legendary as a road player. His legacy lives on, in particular, in Canton, Ohio where his accomplishments were passed on from the poolrooms to barber shops. He was loved by everyone and by people of all walks of life: politicians, doctors, athletes, actors, authors, reporters and newscasters. Don was truly a dignitary to the city; no matter if he was at a sporting event, a Hall of Fame luncheon or a benefit dance at the Canton Jewish Center. Dignitary is another word I would not use when describing any other pool player unless it is used in a poolroom. Willis was different. He was a dignitary to everyone. Listen to a conversation at your local golf course and Tiger Woods will eventually be the topic of choice. However, if you were at a poolroom, it was Willis who would be named. 

    The Canton Repository Newspaper wrote about him regularly for he was a household name in his hometown and his daily life was news to its readers. Willis had been written about in magazines including Sports Illustrated, newspapers and Billiard News at least 100 times through the years. He even had television documentaries and appeared on radio talk shows. He has had not lines nor paragraphs, but chapters written about him in the two classics, John Grissims “Billiards” and Thomas Fensch “The Lions and the Lambs”. The latter speaks of “Lions” as the roadies, money players and the like while “Lambs” are tournament and exhibition players. Willis was not just a lion but he was the pride. Later, the great Robert Byrnes would talk about him in his book “The Wonderful World of Pool and Billiards”, which is still in circulation. What did this Willis man have that modern day pool players lack? This article is about Willis, the pool player and Willis the man.

    Born May 1, 1909, Willis started playing pool at the age of 13 at the local YMCA. "I came up during the Depression," Willis once explained. "There wasn’t $4 in town, including in people’s pockets," He told Steve Doerschuk, of the Canton Repository in a 1979 article. He continued on to say "About the only guys who seemed to have any money were pool players. I made pretty fair money for those days. I’d have to have been Clarence Darrow to have made the kind of money (as a lawyer) as I have playing pool." Like a lot of young people, I started out wanting to be a doctor or a lawyer", he said, "When I decided I didn't want to go to college, my mother cried for a month", Willis said, "But I could make too much uptown. If you can make $1,200 playin pool, you're not gonna go to school that afternoon." 

    Ask any amateur player how they define pressure and compare their response to what Willis endured on a daily basis. Amateurs don’t know what pressure is as it relates to pool. They have families and jobs. Pool is simply a game - an outlet. They work, that is where they earn their keep. Pressure is nothing more than the excitement they want to feel during their time away from work. Win or lose, players go home where there is always food on the table. The next day, they go back to work, where there is always income to make the payments on their house or apartment and two cars. Willis grew up during the depression. He would play literally to put food on the table. Grissim writes, in his book “Billiards”:

    “I was thirteen when I started playing pool at the YMCA in my home town of Canton, Ohio. That was in 1923. By the time the Depression hit I was pretty good. I was also married and had a set of twin daughters so I began playing pool for money out of necessity. There wasn’t much else to do. I had three kids by the age of 22. "I didn't dare miss." says Willis, "And with three mouths to feed I couldn’t afford to lose. You couldn’t tell the gas company you overcut the eight ball and you’d pay’ em next week. So what I did was I actually played for the groceries. I’d imagine I was shooting the milk in the corner, playing position on the potatoes, then I’d put the bread in the side and end up with a break shot on the hamburgers. That’s about the truth.”

    Alternatively, as he explained to Doerscher: "I don’t play tournaments, never have", "You don’t make money playing in tournaments. Lassiter made $10,600 playing tournaments one year", he explained. "That wouldn’t keep me in whiskey." His jowly face would shake in good humor at such a remark. But more often than not, his furtive eyes would reveal an uneasiness about having his picture taken to accompany the interview in which the words were spoken. "If somebody sees my picture, and knows who I am, and tells someone, then I don’t make any money, " he reasoned in 1977, before agreeing to pose at a pool table. "I never made any money having my picture taken." Nevertheless, even without his seeking acclaim, the legend of Don Willis grew to mythical proportions over the years, to the point where it is difficult to separate fact from fiction.”

    So, if you think you are playing under pressure because you’re gambling your last dollar of “sin money” before payday, or you could really use the extra money you can win by cashing in a tournament to fund your next vacation, well, that isn’t pressure at all compared to conditions under which he shot. With Willis, pool was a necessity not a game: it provided him and his family a fairly good living for many years. He had beaten every world champion pool player of his era. Therefore, it is no wonder that he would be able to support a family all by playing pool. 

    According to Grissim, though he spent a rough and tumble life on the road, he has a marriage that lasted, he raised six kids and sent them through school, paid his taxes, lived comfortably and enjoyed a solid reputation as a man of his word. His children are: 

  * Daughter, homemaker

  * Daughter, Retired executive secretary of Timken Company

  * Daughter, Retired school principal of Canton City Schools

  * Daughter, Retired executive secretary to President - Doctors Hospital

  * Daughter, Cosmetologist (now deceased)

  * Son, Black belt, owned a Karate school plus a sign painting business

    Don had 13 grandchildren and 33 great grandchildren. He was once quoted to tell a newspaper reporter: "I guess if you had to sum it up, you could say that I’d rather play Joe Blow for $7, than the World’s Champion for nothing."  "That sounds pretty good. Yeh, that’s it. I’d rather play anyone for $7 than the World’s Champion for the fun of it." 

    I have read the above statement over a hundred times and despite what he said, I think I know him better than that. Is his attitude, as written, consistent with the following story of how he acquired the high run in Canton, Ohio? I’ll let you be the judge.

    "Jimmy Caras was champion of the world. I didn't like him and he didn't like me. I beat him every time.  He comes to my home town, if you can imagine that, and breaks my record by running 206 balls. In my home town of Canton, Ohio. It took me a couple of years. I was playing on the same table and ran 210. The proprietor stopped the match and brought out champagne and sparkling burgundy. After having several, I went back and ran six more before missing." The next day the headline of the story read, "210 before and six after - champagne and pool don't mix." 

    I was at Imperial Lanes a few years ago, talking with Joe Monastery about old pool matches on his tables. He then told the above story about Willis. It wasn’t until a few years later when I started doing research that I came across an article in the National Billiard News, recounting the very story Joe told me. 

    Amazingly, nobody in the city knew of his 216-ball run and the history behind it except for Mantra and perhaps a few others. We complain about poor conditions. Do you know what kinds of distractions take place in a bowling alley? In the 60's, Imperial Lanes did not have a separate area for their tables. They were located on the same floor as the lanes, directly next to the main traffic area and separated at that time, only by a lattice wall. Did he make his run on a table in back? No! He made it on Number one - that’s the one table that also gets the counter traffic. To run fifteen consecutive plus racks is inconceivable to me! Imagine if you will, the many distractions that must have been encountered: unknowing customers rummaging about; bowling balls being cannoned down the lanes - clashing against pins being tossed aimlessly; and noises of unforgiving pin setters scouring the lanes. Bowling alleys are not made to preserve unrelenting quiet, the common denominator in old poolrooms.

    For a man claiming he would rather play a cheap money game than a world champion for nothing, that Willis story tells me he played for personal pride as well as civic pride. That wasn’t part of his “shtick” that he led the public to believe. He also had runs of 206, 216, 230 plus a high run of 281 balls. I am convinced if money were on the line, he would have run more.  Willis also holds the record for most consecutive wing shots. Moreover, he has been the greatest Wing-shot artist the game has ever had. The Wing-shot, probably the hardest of the trick shots, became a Willis trademark years ago. It consists of rolling a ball down the table and shooting and pocketing it as it rolls. "They called me Wing-Shot Willie", Willis says. "My record is 42 in a row. I’ve done that twice - once recently - 42." 

    I spoke with a local pool player, Jim Burkhart, who told me he once witnessed Willis make about twenty consecutive wing shots for money... And Burkhart rolled the balls! That must be even more difficult not having the benefit of the ‘feel’ - of knowing precisely where or how hard the balls are being rolled. You be the judge - try a few wing shots at home and then have a buddy roll the balls instead. 

    Willis had incredible eye-hand coordination, which gave him the ability to make seemingly impossible wing shots. However, the shot that made Willis most famous, despite his accomplishments at Imperial, despite his incredible skill with the wing shot, was his shot shall we say off the table. In “Billiards” Grissim tells of the trick that made him famous: 

    “I first saw Don Willis sitting along the wall in the practice room at Fred Whalen’s World Invitation Tourney in 1973. He was a short paunchy rather nondescript man in his early sixties, wearing a brown suit over a surgical green polyester sport shirt. He had meaty hands, wore an old gold watch with a thick expansion wrist band, spoke with a Midwestern drawl and for all appearances looked like your friendly neighborhood butcher on vacation.”

    ... There wasn’t a contestant there who didn’t know him and have at least one outrageous story to tell about him. Don Willis is pooldom’s greatest unknown player. 

    Aw, I’m too old, fellas, he groaned. I can’t make a ball anymore. But one afternoon he stepped up to the table and made 11 wing shots in a row before he missed, then performed the trick that made him famous: He put the cue ball a few inches away from the three ball, then caromed the cue ball off the three and off the table where it bounced on the floor, rolled out of the practice room and into the middle of the hallway about 60 feet away where it hit the four ball. Johnny Ervolino swears he once saw Willis do that same shot in New York, only the cue ball went down two flights of stairs, rolled under a steam radiator and then kissed the four next to a hallway trash bin - for MONEY! 

    I’ve seen Don run over 40 racks in nine ball, says Fred Whalen. I don’t mean pocketing something on the break every time but if the other fellow missed a shot, he’d run out every time. Now Don played for the cash and nobody ever beat him. He’s one of the great, great players of all time. “

    Shortly after his marriage in 1928, Willis and his wife took a trip from Canton to her parents' house in Newark, NJ "We had $15 which would about get you there if you didn't have too many flat tires," he says. "We stopped in Greensburg, Pa, which is just outside of Pittsburgh. "My wife stayed in the hotel room and I went down to the local pool hall. I beat Pete The Greek out $1,500. I got paid in ones, fives, tens and twenties. It wasn't folded very good". He went back to the hotel and began stacking the money in a better order. His wife took a look at this and started to cry. "She thought I'd robbed a bank", says Willis laughing. "Since then I've never looked back." 

    Willis was not just a one-sport athlete. In fact, he excelled at literally everything he tried. Though he earned his reputation hustling pool - Willis said the game was "just a sidelight." "I never depended entirely on pool", he said. "Why I could make 100 times as much money playin’ cards as I could playn’ pool." It is said, he beat eleven world champions in three different sports. He won the Akron City table-tennis championship plus the Canton City table-tennis championship in 1933 and followed with the Stark County open table-tennis tournament. In addition, he beat Jimmy McClure of Indianapolis, national titleholder, in two of three table tennis exhibitions according to a 1934 article. He also beat Sol Schiff, another former world table tennis champion. At horseshoes, he beat champion George May. Add these to nine world champion pool players, including Caras, Greenleaf and Mosconi, and the count was actually twelve. 

    Willis was often seen with such notables as his best friend and former Cy Young Pitcher, Dean Chance, Early Wynn, Herb Score, Bo Belinski, Bob Lemon, Hall of Fame Quarterback Bob Waterfield and his wife the actress, Jane Russell. He played literally all over the world including one period when he represented the United States in exhibition matches in Saudi Arabia. If only he was alive today, perhaps some of his character would rub off on contemporary players. There is one thing Willis never did. He never knocked another competitor. "I didn't get my reputation by knocking people. I got it by beating them. My sensibilities are such that I'm too high class for that. If I'd see it in print, it would hurt me." Isn’t this a breath of fresh air because so many contemporary players do put down others! In addition, despite the arrogance, pomposity and selfishness many professional pool players seem to possess, Don Willis was always willing to aid a worthy cause. One such cause that warmed his heart came in December of 1969 when he was invited to give a pocket billiard exhibition in Mannington, W.Va., site of the tragic mine disaster. The benefit raised $1,000 which was given to the widows of the miners who perished. Willis also enjoyed visiting the Canton Police Boys Club regularly to present Ping-Pong clinics for the young members. 

    Because Willis prohibited photos and didn’t play in tournaments, the public knows very little of the man. I understand this to help explain the quizzical look on the faces of my classmates. Further, he was never a world titleholder. In fact, he holds no titles to any official pool tournaments. Notwithstanding, he shall always be regarded by those in Canton, Ohio as one of the best players of all time. Further substantiation is based on testimony from the following authorities:

    Former World Champion, Luther "Wimpy" Lassiter, a life long friend and fellow road warrior is quoted as saying: 

"If I ever had to have someone else shoot pool for my life, win or lose, live or die, the man that I'd have shooting for me is Don Willis." 

    In a National Billiard News article, in their April, 1965, issue, they state: “It is our opinion that Don Willis of Canton, Ohio has beaten more top notch players than any other player in the world. Dons list of "victims" reads like the "whose who" of Billiards.”

Erwin Rudolph 35
Don Willis 125
"High Run Willis 88"

Bobby Moore 33
Don Willis 125
"High Run Willis 48"

James Caras 97
Don Willis 100
"High Run Willis 87 and out"

Ralph Greenleaf 40
Don Willis 125
"High Run Willis 66 and out"

Willie Mosconi 65
Don Willis 125
"High Run Willis 70 and out"

J.B. we still say Don was a pretty fair player even though he never won a tournament. 

    In their June 1965 issue, they further explain their position, after having been challenged by a reader:  “J.B. of Detroit writes - "How do you rate "Don Willis" so high? I never heard of his winning any tournaments! 

    Don never entered a tournament, so naturally, hasn’t won any. We will try to answer your question - In talking to dozens of top players over the years, almost without exception they rate "Don" as either the best or as good as any nine-ball player in the country. For example we will give you a few quotes.”

    Jimmy Moore - one of the top players of all time, "In 35 years I only lost once for money. I lost to Don Willis in Louisville, KY. Al Coslosky, veteran Pha.[Philadelphia] player who won the World nine-ball title a few years ago says "Every Worlds Tournament I attended Willis had an open challenge to play anyone nine-ball." Luther Lassiter, (photo from Grissim’s book "Billiards"), considered the best money player of all time said "Don Willis has the heart of a lion, if he were to play regular, he is subject to beat anyone". Harold Worst Worlds Champion Three cushion players in Sports Illustrated March 20, 1961 - "Don Willis in my opinion is the best nine-ball player in the World". From the files of the Canton, Ohio Daily Newspaper: 

    Those are former world champions describing Willis, the pool player. Now, how about Willis describing Willis, the man - shall we say, in Lou Gehrig fashion:

    "I've had a good life. I've been married 48 years. I'm more in love today with my wife (Mary) than I ever was. I'm pretty well respected in my hometown I guess. I've never been arrested for anything. I've never stolen anything. "All my kids (six) are happily married. I'm the luckiest guy that ever lived." 

    This quote was taken from a Birmingham News reporter, for their January 30, 1977 edition, featuring an article about the legendary Don Willis. He appropriately describes himself as a loving family man, which was often overlooked by those who knew of him, unfortunately, because of his lifestyle. 

    Hampered by diabetes and heart problems, including a heart attack at a Hall of Fame luncheon, Don curtailed his appearances in later years but continued benefits for needy causes. Married for 55 years, Don Willis died on March 2, 1984 at the age of 74. 

    I think Mr. Grissim best described him recently. When asked for permission to use his material, Mr. Grissim graciously agreed and ended by writing: 

    "I remember Don with much fondness. He epitomized the best of American sporting life during an era in our history when it was possible for a brilliant player and good-hearted practitioner of the soft con to make a wonderful living, support a loving family, and sleep with a clear conscience." 

    Sadly, few people know of the Willis stories, his sometimes-unbelievable accomplishments as a man, as a player and as an entertainer. Time after time as these former pool greats die, their stories are buried with them, sadly, forever unrecorded.  It was for this reason, the Greater Canton Amateur Billiard Association (GCABA) was born - so that these legends could be remembered and their accomplishments never forgotten. The GCABA selects, formally inducts and honors local amateur pool players for their accomplishments and/or service to billiards. Don Willis was a charter member. While he was certainly not an amateur by any means, his accomplishments as a player and as a man are so overwhelming that it would have been a disservice not to include him as the premier charter member. He certainly is a great a role model for all of us to emulate! In the meanwhile, you can read more about the legendary Don Willis at our web site. Our address is: http://www.gcaba.com/willis.htm