In 1991 the Professional Bowlers Association received $200,000 per show from ABC. In 1997 it was paying ABC $150,000 per show to stay on the air. The receipts have been public for twenty years. No major bowling video has ever cited them.
Earl Anthony won 43 PBA titles and 6 Player of the Year awards. Twelve million people watched him bowl every Saturday for a decade. No major American network talk show ever booked him. Not once.
In 1991 the American Bowling Congress approved a coverstock chemistry it didn’t understand. Within fifteen months the inventor admitted it killed bowling.
In February 2022, three bowling balls failed pre-broadcast hardness testing at the PBA Tournament of Champions. The PBA banned the balls, never named the bowlers, and changed the rule. It’s the same thing they did in 1973.
On August 1, 2019, the United States Bowling Congress killed the only rule protecting bowling’s competitive integrity. Forty-two days later, Bowlero bought the Professional Bowlers Association.
The Professional Bowlers Association traces back to an 1841 Connecticut law that banned nine-pin bowling. The folk story about how bowlers beat it isn’t true.
In 1980, 9.8 million Americans belonged to a bowling league. More than 22 million watched the PBA Tour on a single Saturday afternoon. The sport’s collapse was already 18 years old.
In 1980, 9.8 million Americans bowled in a sanctioned league. Forty years later, that number had dropped by 89%. This is the full history of professional bowling in America.
