This is 99% invisible. I'm Roman Mars

We live in a post billiards world. There was an age of billiards and it has been over for so long most of us have no idea how huge billiards once was.

A hundred years ago, there were 830 pool halls in my city of Chicago. Now if you had up all the gas stations, all

the McDonald's and all the Starbucks in Chicago right now, you'd be nowhere close to that

number. You'd be a little under 600 if you want to be exact.

And I know you do, you beautiful nerds.

Today, Chicago has fewer than 10 Pool Falls.

That is Dan Weisman.

Reporter, Chicagoan.

Dan originally reported this story for a marketplace.

So Billiards, not what it used to be.

But this is a post-Billiard's world in a much more profound sense because the growth of billiards led to the development of a material that, for better or worse, came to define the modern world.

I just want to say one word to you. Just one word. You

listening? Plastics. This story starts with a guy named Michael Phelan.

Who's regarded by everybody as really the father of American Billiards.

That's Michael Seamus.

He's the author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Billiards.

Phelan was a brilliant player, but he also raised awareness of the sport, promoted it,

arranging the biggest big money matches.

Phalan was totally remarkable because he was everything. He was an all around

everything guy. He started a huge billiards hall in San Francisco. He patented a new

kind of billiards and then he took the money he had won playing billiards and writing books on billiards and used it to become the first big manufacturer of billiards tables and equipment.

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