Just in time for American Legion Post 1045’s (almost) annual Shuffleboard tournament to begin, the playing surface received a major facelift.
Island resident Austin McPhail made time to take on the project, starting with removing the cracked and peeling old layers of poly to get down to the original wood playing surface running the whole length of the table. Austin carefully wet and dry sanded between each of the 9 coats of self-leveling polyurethane to achieve a much-improved board surface.
Shuffleboard tournaments began on Fishers Island in the late 1950’s when the American Legion purchased the table. It was originally placed in the bar room with a coin operated scoreboard.
Last refurbished about 10 years ago, the table is appreciated by experts as being one of very few original American Shuffleboard Company tables built in the early 1950’s and still in continual use. Running 22’ in length and weighing over 950 pounds, the table is a main focal point in the Legion’s hall. To decrease friction, the table is sprinkled with tiny beads of silicone. Acting like ball bearings, the beads let the quoits (pucks) slide down the table with only a slight push.
Object of the Game:
The object of the game is to push one’s weighted quoits down a shuffleboard table into the scoring area at the opposite end of the table. In table shuffleboard games, shooting is performed with one’s hands as opposed to deck shuffleboard’s use of cue sticks. In order to score, a player’s quoits must be farther down the board than the quoits of his opponent. This may be achieved either by knocking off the opponent’s quoits or by out-distancing them. The game ends when a player or team reaches 21 points.
If you are interested in volunteering for a project at the American Legion, please let an officer know, or join us for the Spring Clean Up Day, date TBD.
