History

Bingo was created in Italy in 1530 as a form of modified lottery. By 1778 the game had spread to France and being played by the educated and well to do. Cards at this time were divided into three horizontal rows and nine vertical columns. In the 1800s bingo really started to take off and gained greater notoriety in Europe. The fun benefits of the game were also recognized as good educational tool to help children in learning across various disciplines.

The Italian lottery the game soon made its journey to America via a carnival touring through Germany. The game gained huge popularity and had great appeal as a carnival tent game. The game was modified including allowing players to complete a row vertically, horizontally or diagonally. The original name for the game was Beano.

Whilst working at the carnival one night in 1929 near Atlanta a traveling toy salesman, Edwin S. Lowe, came into the carnival and instantly saw the appeal of the game, the tent was so crowded with people that Lowe wasn't even able to play it Lowe saw how excited the crowd was and decided to take the game one step further.

Lowe understood by its popularity and the excitement it gave to the players the game of beano could be utilized to generate finances. Returning to New York, Lowe created his own version of the game by getting some beans, cardboard and a rubber number stamp. He then invited friends round to play the game where he saw how excited they where when playing it. During the game, one player had accidentally yelled out "Bingo" and the name stuck.

It was a priest called Wilkes-Barre from Pennsylvania who began to advocate playing bingo in his community. A parishioner came up with the idea of using Bingo as a way to raise money for the church. However with only 24 individual cards to play with, there was a big problem in that there were far too many winners for each game which is not the greatest way of raising funds. Lowe was contacted about producing a larger number of combinations for the cards. Lowe recognizing a further progression in the money potential of the game contact a professor of mathematics at Columbia University called Carl Leffler. Increasing the number of bingo cards was exactly what was needed to make the game a massive success at church communities up and down the country and a sound source of fund-raising came.

The game you see today has been modified and changed to add player enjoyment and the chance of winning large sums of money to lucky players. From its humble origins Bingo has become one of the most popular forms of games in the world and is loved by generations.

Bingo loves the game of Bingo and we hope that our unique chat games, schedules, promotions and tournaments make our version of the game the most fun.