Blog

Jul 10, 2023

Slimantics: Raid stirs pool hall memories

When I was growing up, my dad worked for the Tupelo Water and Light Department

When I was growing up, my dad worked for the Tupelo Water and Light Department and sometimes had to work a 4-hour shift as a dispatcher on Saturday. When I was around 10, he would bring me and my older brother, Mick, 14, to work with him and we’d roam around every corner of the old building, although there wasn't much interesting to discover unless you were really into pipe fittings and water meters.

The Water Department was then located on Court Street, which ran parallel to Main Street, a block north of Tupelo Hardware, which today is a tourist attraction. That is where Gladys Presley bought a guitar for her son, Elvis. She had intended to buy him a bicycle, but when she and Elvis arrived at the store the story goes that a 22-caliber rifle caught Elvis’ attention. Gladys wasn't crazy about buying her kid a gun. The guitar was a compromise purchase. Just think, if Gladys had bought a bike or a gun, it's possible no one would have ever heard of Elvis. Remember that when somebody tells you compromise is bad.

Although that story was part of the local folklore, no one at that time thought about making it a tourist stop. The most interesting thing on that city block wasn't the hardware store, but the pool hall located behind the hardware store on Court Street, opposite the Water Department.

The Court Street Pool Hall was, depending on your level of piety, a den of iniquity or the most exciting place in town. Stories were told of the big-money pool games and the inevitable fights, all involving straight razors or knives. Preachers regularly sermonized about the evils of the place, but we kids were in awe of it.

Although my dad was a Sunday school teacher and deacon, he didn't see any harm in allowing me and Mick to go to the pool hall on those Saturday mornings while he was working. At that hour, the Court Street Pool Hall was as safe as a church sanctuary at the same hour and about as populated. There was the old man who owned the pool hall and a "rack boy," a Black kid about our age. The pool game was free; you paid to have the balls racked, and only a rack boy could do that. I think the cost was a quarter. The idea of yelling "rack" and seeing somebody scurry over to set up the next game made us feel like we were big shot pool hustlers like Minnesota Fats.

The pool room was cool and dark, illuminated only by the box lights suspended over each of the pool or snooker tables. Mick said the place was kept dark on purpose to hide the blood stains on the floors.

We never witnessed a knife/razor fight since the only people we ever saw there were each other, the old owner and the rack boy.

But the idea of being in the very place where, in maybe 10 or 12 hours, a dispute over a game of pool would lead to a knife fight was pretty exciting.

I had not thought much about pool halls until this week when the Starkville Police Department sent out a release about a raid on Southern Billiards on Sunday and all those memories of the notorious Court Street Pool Hall came flooding back.

I don't mean to make light of criminal activity, but being raided by the cops is sort of a mark of authenticity for a pool hall and this raid was a top-shelf operation. It included not only the police department but the Mississippi Gaming Commission and the state Alcohol Beverage Control. I guess the National Guard and Homeland Security had the day off, it being a Sunday and all.

According to the press release, Southern Billiards was issued citations for gambling and local and state alcohol offenses. The release vaguely noted that "multiple items used for illegal gambling and narcotics (cocaine, marijuana) were seized." No one was arrested, though, which suggests it wasn't exactly the crime of the century.

Nothing about the raid was shocking. People gamble on pool. They also gamble on golf. On any given Saturday morning, money changes hands in games of "Wolf" or "Skins" at the Starkville Country Club. You don't see country clubs getting raided, though. Of course, unlike Southern Billiards, the golf courses aren't located next door to the police department.

We’ve had legalized gambling for years now, so the idea somebody would wager on a game doesn't hold much shock value.

If and when more details about the raid emerge, I might be inclined to see this as a more serious offense. But if the main result of all this is that the SPD found people at Southern Billiards were gamblin’, drinkin’ and otherwise carousing, I’m not too worried about public safety.

I hope Southern Billiards survives the raid and will keep on firing the imagination of kids and feeding the nostalgia of old-timers like me.

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].

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