History of Bingo

Bingo, lovers everywhere want to play Bingo many times a week. There are holidays, special occasions and family functions that have been ‘put off’ or put on ‘hold’ because you as the Bingo lover wanted to go play but did you ever wonder how Bingo got started? How did the game evolve into what it is today? Let’s look a bit closer.

Bingo can first be seen in history in the very early 1500’s in Italy. This game was more like that of a lottery that was only played by the most wealthy in the land but after a few years it was open to more people of the land. The Italian lottery was called Lo Giuoco del Lotto D’Italia. After a few years, the name of this Bingo lottery was shortened to Le Lotto.

Germans adopted this lottery game as method of teaching their children in math, and various other subjects like spelling and history. In the early years of 1700 the game of Bingo lottery is seen in the history of France where the use of cards and Bingo chips were first used.

Bingo finally made its appearance in North America in the 1920’s but it was first called Beano instead of Bingo. A man from New York name, Edwin Lowe renamed Beano to Bingo when he heard a winner yell the wrong word one time. With his continued effort to increase the ways that Bingo could be played, he worked until 1930 with Carl Leffler to increase the numbers on Bingo cards to 6,000 different variations. With the many variations in the numbers playing Bingo, it would make it more difficult for someone to win at that point.

It is thought that a priest in Pennsylvania heard about Lowe and Leffler’s new approach to the Beano game and wanted to implement Bingo as a fundraising method in his churches. Through the early years of the 1930’s Bingo become very popular raising money through Bingo while entertaining many. By the end of the 1930’s, it is thought that over 10,000 games of Bingo were being played each week raising money from all ranks of the classes for the churches.

Where is Bingo Played?

Bingo is played in social halls, clubs and in amusement parks. Bingo continues to grow as a fundraiser for many types of societies such as for Firemen’s associations, schools, and even as fundraising for critically ill patients. The rules and the complexity of the game do change a bit from Bingo hall to Bingo hall but the over all concept of the game and the rules remain the same.

Bingo is played online and offline. Offline, Bingo players mark hard card or paper cards as the caller calls out the ball numbers. When the Bingo player creates the pattern that is required at this certain time, the Bingo player yells out Bingo and receives a monetary prize. Sometimes other prizes are given in lieu of cash such as baskets, pottery, cooking supplies, cars, houses, computers and just about anything that can be given away in such a lottery!

Online Bingo is similar to the offline game, but you use your mouse to mark the spots on the card and the computer uses are program referred to as a random number generator to tell you what the next number that you should mark on you card is.

A Bingo card usually have 24 numbered spaces with one free space in the middle. There are a few Bingo cards out there where the middle space is not free, but does include a number. Across the top of the Bingo card are the letters B I N G O and the balls that are called out will correspond to these letters and the numbers possible on the card at any given instance.

Although a complete series of 6,000 combinations where brought about and created in the 1930’s, today there is a series of 9,000 combinations possible on some types of Bingo cards.

A complete guide to Bingo halls can be found by searching your yellow pages, your local newspapers and by calling local churches for timesof games.