Excerpt from the book Sports the Olympics Forgot This book describes 40 sports that ought to be played but aren’t, because I made them up.

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The first Jackson Hole Pool Curling Contest was held in January 1920 when Jim Jeffries’ team, the J Hole Potters, were the winners and declared World Champions. They beat the Wyoming Wyatt team 27 – 25 in the final in a contest that went to the final rock. Jeffries had saved the match in regulation time by drawing a triple double cannon from the rocks that deposited two of his teams’ stones into pockets for a three point equalizing score. He then won the contest at the third extra end with a cannon from the back of the house that slid slowly into the middle pocket for two points and the victory.

It was only the following year the contest went truly global when a team from Canada, the Ottawa Poolers, entered the competition though they finished last of the six teams. They did produce one of the greatest ever shots witnessed at the contest when Bert Orr hurled his stone down the rink and scored 7 points with a quintuple cannon that resulted in four of his team’s stones scoring points. This was scant consolation for his team as they were 43 – 1 down at the time having been swept to defeat by the brush skills of Herrman “Cream” Dogh. Dogh picked up the line of the shot very quickly and could make a stone fly 20% faster with his heavy brushstrokes; Dogh also specialized in brushing opposition rocks to the edge of the house where they were of little use.

The first multiple winners were the Aspen Potters who won from 1923 – 1925 thanks to the skip Brandy Berton and his tactic of containment. His team were excellent curlers and could balance their rocks on the edge of the pockets and remove similarly placed stones of opponents. Berton’s great tactic was to place his team’s stones between those of his opponent and the pockets so that any contact propelled his stone towards the hole.