A look at the bowling craze of Utah’s past

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — In the 1950s, one out of eight Americans had one thing in common: Bowling.

Back in the 1950s, ABC4 even had five bowling shows per week. ABC4’s Craig Wirth threw his fair share of gutter balls over the years and decided he would be better at talking about bowling rather than going for the strikes and the spares.

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Many relatives likely had their own treasured bowling bag carrying a ball with custom holes and, of course, those great bowling shoes. Don’t forget the bowling shirts with the team name on the back.

There was probably no bigger individual sport than bowling in the 50s and 60s. There were thousands of folks in leagues all over Utah, companies sponsored team after team, and our station — called KDYL back then — had a team.

Back in those glory years of the 50s, it seemed like you bowled all the time. Some places were just for fun, but other places were for the league — and then there were those iconic bowling trophies.

As people bowled in dozens of bowling centers, some places are just memories now. But one Utah bowler has all those memories — and lots of the trophies.

Bev Miller has been bowling since 1952, back when you could bowl in a new center every day for a month, with a couple more to spare.

“I think you considered what kind of bowling you wanted to do, whether it was for fun or for competitive, and I bowled like the old Paldemar, and the Rancho Lanes and they no longer exist,” Miller told Wirth. “But I did follow the competitive path”

Now the ultimate competitive path all those years ago was to be accepted into the lady major leagues in Utah, to play with the best of the best.

“That was one of my bucket list, when I was bowling,” Miller said. “I wasn’t in the lady majors and had that in my sight.

Miller made it and still bowls in the lady majors — that’s right, they are still going to this day.

As you can guess, Utah was quite the place for bowling back then. Sure, the country was in its own bowling craze, but Utah was right up there. In fact, one of our station’s first big TV shows was bowling from Ritz Classic Lanes, and our “Pin Busters” show was always big.

Every league score made the papers, tournaments were big news, and you had ads in about every paper.

Even the ads were almost as competitive as bowling: A ball, bag, and shoes at Wolfs Sporting Goods for $32.50 with six months to pay. A ball, bag, and shoes as undercut by Zinik’s at $31.80.

People were even stealing a ball, bag, and shoes out of station wagons when you had the real deluxe set and paid $33.50 for it. But once you were inside the bowling center, it was quite something.

There was always a new bowler almost every night as the sport grew — that’s actually one of Bev’s biggest memories.

“I remember, people that worked there, how they tried to encourage you,” Miller said.

And with the popularity of the game, the lanes — and even the bowling balls — changed from being pretty plain to being the groovy colors of the 60s. Back then, it seemed like everyone bowled.

“It was a good relief for an entire family to have something to do at a reasonable cost,” Miller said.

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