William Weston (1847–1935) was an Australasian billiards champion and was an early teacher of former world champion,

Walter Lindrum Walter Albert Lindrum, OBE (29 August 1898 – 30 July 1960), often known as Wally Lindrum, was an Australian professional player of English billiards who held the World Professional Billiards Championship from 1933 until his retirement in 1950 ...

. He toured Australia and New Zealand as playing partner to John Roberts Jr. when Roberts visited Australia.

Early years

Weston was born in Middle End Street,

Longton Longton may refer to several places: * Longton, Kansas, United States * Longton, Lancashire, United Kingdom * Longton, Staffordshire, United Kingdom See also * Longtan (disambiguation) * Longtown (disambiguation) Longtown may refer to several plac ...

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...

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, in 1847 and came to Australia with his parents at the age of three. Growing up in Richmond, at the age of 15 he left to find work at

Woods Point, Victoria Woods Point is a small town in Victoria, Australia and is located on the banks of the Goulburn River. At the , Woods Point and the surrounding area had a population of 37, down from 94 in 2006. History The town began as a general store built by ...

, delivering bread to the miners at the Morning Star reef gold mine and it was in the Reefers Hotel in Woods Point he first played billiards. He toured playing billiards through Victoria and New South Wales when in May 1872, a W. Hitchins was reported to be the best billiard player in Australia. He was offering 400 and 500 in 1000 and Weston, now at the age of 25, challenged him against all odds and to everyone's surprise, beat him after an exciting game.

Billiards career

Weston then travelled through New South Wales and Victoria as champion of New South Wales, visiting many principal towns of both states, playing exhibition games and engaging in billiard competitions before moving to New Zealand where he set up a billiard saloon in

Dunedin Dunedin ( ; mi, Ōtepoti) is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand (after Christchurch), and the principal city of the Otago region. Its name comes from , the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Th ...

, becoming a champion there and then Australasian champion. Arriving in Coolgardie, Western Australia, in 1894, he set up a billiard saloon in Ford Street and a carrying and forwarding agents business in Sylvester Street. His champion horse team of 5 bays

bay (horse) Bay is a hair coat color of horses, characterized by a reddish-brown or brown body color with a black point coloration on the mane, tail, ear edges, and lower legs. Bay is one of the most common coat colors in many horse breeds. The black a ...

won the world record for drawing 9 ton 12 cwt on a bush road from Coolgardie to Kalgoorlie distance of 26 miles in 11 hours on 4 September 1896 returning to Coolgardie on 6 September 1896. His contemporary agents were J. Flammery & Co, Henderson & Co, Clime, Eastwood & Co and others, all participated with Weston in transporting merchandise to the outback. These firms carried many swampers who were eagerly pushing to newer goldfields farther north such as Menzies, Leonora,

Mount Margaret Mount Margaret was an abandoned town located northeast of Perth and southwest of Laverton in the Goldfields-Esperance region of Western Australia. The first European to visit the area was government surveyor John Forrest who passed throug ...

, Mount Morgans and Erlston. A year after the extension of the railway line, Weston moved his billiard saloon and timber residence to Kalgoorlie where he opened his billiard saloon and tobacconists shop on the corner of Brookman and Wilson Streets. When

, who was born in Kalgoorlie, was a boy, he used to visit Weston's billiard saloon and Weston took the future world champion around the table teaching him shots, in particular , a method to increase . He maintained his businesses until his death on 13 August 1935 and is buried in the Kalgoorlie Cemetery.The Argus (Melbourne, Vic 1848 – 1957, Wednesday 14 August 1935, page 8

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weston, Billy 1847 births 1935 deaths Australian players of English billiards Cue sports players from Western Australia English emigrants to colonial Australia Sportspeople from Dunedin Burials in Western Australia