A Salute to the Bingo Caller

A Salute to the Bingo Caller
Dec 7 2009 10:53PM by Bingo Ben

I have to admit, for a so-called bingo expert, my experience at the brick and mortar bingo halls are limited, to say the least. In fact, I'd say that I can count the number of live, in the flesh bingo experiences on one hand (and perhaps a foot). My love of bingo developed almost entirely from online bingo, chat rooms and boards, and of course, from the extensive research that goes into this humble bingo blog.

True, these days the bingo halls may cater to a different bingo player than our fine friends here online, and I would not trade my friends in the bingo chat rooms for anything, but I've always been fascinated by the social aspects of the live bingo game: the smokey rooms, the relentless pound of hundreds of dabbers, the electricity in the room as the numbers rise and the cash prizes draw nearer... but there's one thing that gives me the biggest kick, and that is the old-school showman caller. Community celebrities, parish priests, would-be vaudevillians, each with their own style of calling the bingo numbers and declaring that rounds winner of the bingo prize.

Now I've written of the games history, and I've pulled out some obscure bingo facts, but recently, I was very lucky to come across a discarded copy of Schott's Sporting Gaming & Miscellany, and as I perused this tome of estorica, lo and behold, I came across on page (Clickety Click) 66 a complete list of traditional bingo calls.

To many of you, this may be common knowledge, but for an online bingo player like me, this was fascinating. I'm familiar, as we all are, with the classics: "Two Fat Ladies"; "More than Eleven, 37"; "Knock at the Door, number 4". But what I didn't know is that there's a whole slew of bingo calls for every bingo number on the board. I hope this isn't boring to you veteran's of the bingo hall, but for my online bingo friends, here are some of the finer rhyming picks from the list:

"Young and Keen, 15"
"Key of the Door, 24"
"Winnie the Pooh, 42"

But what I really enjoyed are the more obscure one that definitely harken back to an earlier day:

"Legs" (11)
"Dirty Girtie" (30)
"Naughty" (40)
"Half a Century" (50)
"Either Way Up" (69)
"Seven Dozen" (84)
"Top of the Shop" (90)

That is all for this week my friends. Don't forget to check out December's great bingo bonuses and promotions. Great stuff coming up, including quite a few cash bingo prizes too.

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