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Useless Facts about Bridge

From Matt Betts, English Bridge Union

What you might not know about Bridge:

• An early version of the game was played in England as far back as the 16th Century.
  
  
• Oliver Cromwell banned all card games during his Protectorate - however after the Restoration and once Charles II was safely on the throne, card games returned!
  
  
• There are two kinds of bridge, rubber which is normally played at home for leisure, and duplicate bridge which is used for competitions.
  
  
• Mrs Anthony Fly, of Little Rock, Arkansas, filed a petition for divorce, on the grounds that her husband refused to make up a four at bridge.
  
  
• The Soviet Union tried to replace the kings, queens and jacks of court cards with heroes of the revolution.
  
  
• The modern form of contract bridge was invented in the Twenties by American billionaire Harold Vanderbilt, who developed an early scoring system for the game.
  
  
• The odds against four players each holding all thirteen cards in a suit are 2,235,197,406,895,366,368,301, 559,999 to one - or the same as Posh and Becks being out of the newspapers. Such a deal was first claimed in March 1892, and has been claimed ever since! Maybe winning the lottery isn't so difficult after all.
  
  
• In June 1995, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) admitted the World Bridge Federation (WBF) as part of the Olympic movement.
  
  

Bridge - A Beautiful Game »

Matt Betts
Communications Officer
English Bridge Union

Tel: 01296 317 215
Email: Matt@ebu.co.uk
Website: www.ebu.co.uk