The origins of the modern game of Bingo can be traced as far back as the 16th Century to the unification of Italy in 1530. The "Lo Giuoco del Lotto d'Italia" was the first state run lottery. It generated a lot of money for the governent and has remained en vogue to this day! If Bingo is to be seen as a lottery, then this is the first documented case of it being played on a large scale.
Also, a close game to the one we play today is the French lottery, Le Lotto which derived from the Italian lottery. Reportedly popular during the late 18th century with wealthy Frenchmen, this game of chance involved a caller drawing out wooden discs numbered 1 to 90 from a bag and shouting them out to the game players. Each player had just one single card divided into 3 rows and 9 columns with numbers organised in much the same way as a modern bingo card. Column 1 had random numbers between 1 and 10, Column 2 between 11 and 20 and so on up to 81-90 on the last column. In addition, every Row had judt 5 numbers and 4 blanks. The winner would be the first person to cover the numbers on an entire row.
Later versions of Le Lotto appeared in Germany, where instead of being used as a gambling game, it was used for educational purposes to teach children their multiplacation tables. Games similar to this are found on the market Today.
Introduction to the United States came in the late 1920's when a New York toy salesman by the name of Edwin S. Lowe stumbled across a carnival game in Georgia. The game of Beano, as the booth-owner called it, involved a caller drawing numbered wooded discs from a bag and shouting them out to the waiting players. Each player had a game card with numbered squares and some dried beans. Every time a number was called out which was on their card, they would mark it with a bean. The first player to have a straight line of beans, either in a horizontal, vertical or diagonal direction was declared the winner.
Lowe then invited friends over to his appartment to play this new game and they were instantly hooked. One time, a woman was so excited that instead of shouting out "Beano!" to signify she had won, she yelled "Bingo!" The name stuck and Lowe went on to create the first marketable version of the game, retailing at $1 for a 12 card set and for a 24 cards.
Bingo soon found it's way out of the family room and into the church, thus presenting it on a much larger scale. Thanks to the fund-raising efforts of a priest from Pennsylvania who saw a great opportunity to raise money for his church by holding bingo gaming events.
By 1934 it was estimated more than 10,000 bingo games were being played a week and today, the national game grosses over million a week in America alone.
