Joe Davis has one of the most outstanding records in sporting history. Fifteen world snooker titles and unbeaten (level) over 20 years. His name is synonymous with the game. Many people these days forget that Joe was also a master amongst masters at billiards with eight appearances in the World Championship final taking the title four times and that against such opposition as Newman, Smith, and McConachy. His losing margins to Lindrum in 1933 and 1934 were 694 and 855 - mere twenty minute breaks.
Joe was born on April 15th, 1901, in the Derbyshire mining village of Whitwell. When he was two his parents moved into the "Travellers Rest," at the nearby Wittington Moor. The boy went to live with his grandparents until he was about eleven when he returned to help his parents who were now running a pub called, "The Queen's Head," a pub which boasted a full-sized billiards table. The cinematograph was becoming popular and Joe's father converted one of the rooms into a cinema. Joe had to work the projector. One day he stopped turning the handle and the film caught fire - Joe was also fired, a fact he says he didn't mind as the job was, "A terrible waste of good billiards time." One of the advantages of the pub table was that it was sunk several inches into the floor, the boy could thus play shots without having to continually use the rest or distort his cue action. His father decided he should have lessons and engaged a good local player by the name of Ernest Rudge. Progress was rapid. Joe made his first century at 12 and won the Chesterfield championship at 13. Rudge was something of a professional billiards promoter and the young Davis was able to see such players as George Gray and Claude Falkiner. Even as a boy Joe played with his cue running under his left eye and Gray remarked that the boy would never become a good player until he altered his sighting. Willie Smith thought differently, "The kid's alright, let him play his own way."
Davis's first professional match was in 1919 against a certain Albert Raynor who he beat by 145 receiving 1000 in 7000. In his first game at Thurstons he made a break if 147 at his first visit to the table. In 1922 he won the Midlands title and entered the World Professional Championship for the first time only to be thrashed by Tom Newman. It was at about this time that, on the advice of Willie Smith, Joe changed his cue. He found a stiffer and heavier cue in the racks of the local parish institute, it belonged to a chap called Fred Frazer, Joe fancied it and bought it, "The price was 7s 6d (about 40p) and I have been grateful for a lifetime."
Joe's first 500 break (599) came in the second division championship of 1924 (Interesting to note that Russell made his first 500 in competition when he was about 19. Ed) Newman walloped him by over six thousand in the 1926 world championship and by over a thousand in 1927 even though Davis made a famous 'pendulum' break of 2501. 1928 was his first big year, by now the Chesterfield man was a master of all aspects of the game, he made his first thousand break (1070) and he won the title beating Newman by more than a thousand and averaging 74.4 (Newman 69.5.) By now he was also the World Snooker Champion and he returned home to Chesterfield with the cups to be welcomed by a crowd of some five thousand. Davis won the billiards title again in '29 and '30 beating Newman (by not too many) with averages of 100 exactly, and 113.1.
In fact Lindrum had made his entrance in the 1929/30 English season during which season he made 67 breaks over the thousand but did not play in the championship. Though Davis was champion there were no illusions as to was the real No. 1. He came back in '30/31, a season in which the championship was not contested, and won the Gold Cup Tournament - an event reckoned to be the greatest tournament ever played. The Final, played from Feb. 1st - 14th, 1931, saw Lindrum play Newman. Newman averaged 169.3 but even with 7000 start was beaten 25,807 - 24,436. Lindrum made breaks of 2853, 2583, 7 other thousands, and averaged an incredible 248.1. It was in January 1932 that Davis sat out three and three quarter hours whilst Lindrum ran up the world record break of 4137 and put up what he afterwards said was one of his own greatest performances by following this mammoth break with one of 1247. Joe had two other thousands in that match (1424, 1276) and actually won the game though in receipt of 7000. Later that season Joe retained his World Title beating McConachy 25,161 - 19,259.
Lindrum entered the Championship in 1933 and duly won it though not before Davis had put up a terrific struggle losing by a mere 694. They played again the following year in Melbourne, Lindrum again winning, Joe said that though the winning margin was only 875 Lindrum was much too good for him and could have won by many more had he wanted. They never played again, it was often suggested that they should, but they never did, indeed they never met. Joe Davis continued to play very high class billiards throughout the thirties winning the U.K. Professional billiards title 5 times from 1934 to 1938 beating Newman in all of the finals. In May 1936 Joe made a break of 1784 under the baulkline rule (cue ball to cross the baulk line between every 180 and 200 points) a break never bettered under that rule.
By 1939 Professional billiards had taken second place to snooker in which game Joe Davis was supreme, indeed he was snooker. But he could still play the old game and in one memorable, "Match," with Willie Smith in 1948 he made a 667 at Billiards and a 130 at snooker, and in the next session made a 639 at billiards, two centuries and a 64 in three frames of snooker.
Where would Joe Davis stand in the pantheon of Professional Billiards. I would put him just behind Lindrum but above the other giants of the thirties. That is just my view. I have always been a fan of Joe and his brother Fred. What can you say of a man who conquered billiards and went on to revolutionise snooker. It is sad for people of my generation that no film of Joe playing in a billiards match survives. What is sure is that a man who could make 87 thousand breaks and 3 two-thousand breaks, together with 687 snooker centuries in public - he only recorded those made in public - must have been an extraordinary player. How I wish I could have met him. Thank you Joe.