Bob Lamb Doubles still meets at Hollywood Bowl every Wednesday night
When Hull man Bob Lamb started a ten pin bowling league in the early 1970s, little did he think it would still be going strong more than 50 years later. And the regular group even attracts bowlers in their 80s who have fond memories of the sport in the city across the years.
Bob, who is 75, ran the Hull Bowl alley, on Sutton Fields industrial estate, throughout the 1970s and 80s when scores of players would compete under imaginative team names. What started off as a “trios league” with 24 lanes of three people competing has lasted an estimated 53 years.
“I started off down at Beverley Road when I was about 19 or 20 years-old in about 1974-1975ish as a part time control clerk”, Bob explained. “My wife worked there on the snack bar for a time and that’s why I bowled there. Unfortunately, it burned down just as we were about to start work at about 6 o’clock at night.
“It went on for a few hours with loads of fire engines attending. They couldn’t save it. The manager at the time was John Perry.”
About two or three years after the devastating fire that destroyed Hull Bowl, a new facility on Sutton Fields was built. That has since become the home of indoor football centre Soccer Kings.
But throughout the late 1970s and early 80s, Bob worked alongside John Perry, first continuing as a control clerk before becoming the assistant manager and later manager. Bob employed Barbara Johnston, who went on to be his deputy manager in the late 1980s and early 1990s before becoming manager. Bob and Barbara, who is 85, are “still best of friends” and bowl together regularly on a Wednesday night at Hollywood Bowl on Kingswood Retail Park, as part of the Bob Lamb Doubles league.
Bob added: “There are a lot people in the same age bracket as me and Barbara, with many of them still bowling from the Beverley Road years. We go out most times and have a couple of drinks, and sometimes we go away for tournaments too.”
The group regularly travels to places such as Mansfield, Shipley, Lincoln and Ashby. Together they have fostered a tight knit social scene with new players are still signing up to the league.
For Bob, it was the creative team names that stick in his memory from the heydays of the 1970s. Names such as Internationals, Sorcerers, Pink Panthers, Wild Alliance. and Smilers.
“I still love it, chucking a ball down there,” says Bob. “And I like to keep the group. My daughter plays in it now, and my son did but is now disabled, and my son in law does.
“Back in the Sutton Fields days, there was no “open play” as I call – just 24 lanes of league players from Sunday night to Sunday night, every night of the week from 6 o’clock until midnight. And that was a mix of bowlers; there was five-man teams, four-man teams, trios, doubles, mixed doubles, all ladies, stuff like that.”
He added: “Those days in the past were very good days. It’s dwindling off a bit now with the majority of leagues playing eight or ten lanes. I’ve got the biggest league and that’s ten lanes of two. Also they’re on strings, which is harder to play. It was easier to play at the old places.
“Also, when you bowled at places like Beverley Road and Sutton Fields, you always had to wear bowling shoes but nowadays you can go in off the street. We still use bowling shoes.”