今天是斯诺克老祖乔-戴维斯（Joe Davis）的112周年生辰。节选一段老乔的自传《The Breaks Came My Way》以表纪念。

摘选了第10章的几段，提到了早期斯诺克的发展和首届斯诺克世锦赛的状况。

本书版权尚处于保护期内，谨向老乔的版权继承者表示歉意和谢意。

Some fifty years after the inventiveness of Chamberlain in Jubbulpore, snooker had become pretty popular in the billiard-halls of Britain. But among the majority of professional billiards players it was still looked down on as an impure knock-about game appealing only to those lacking the skill to play billiards. I well remember one occasion - even later - when I walked into the Midland Hotel, Manchester, where I was playing a snooker exhibition, only to find that old die-hard Tom Reece sitting there (with, as it happened, the young jockey Gordon Richards). As I entered the lobby Tom called out in a loud voice: 'Where's your ruddy corduroys and clogs, then?' He hated the 'tomato' game, as he liked to call it.

However, I had a feeling in my bones that snooker was the game of the future. This was not incredible intuition, merely a sharp observation of the paying customers.

……

It is not hard to see why snooker was so popular with the spectators. The rules are basically extremely simple, there is a great deal going on, it is visually stimulating and the snookers add an element of uncertainty and excitement. It can be appreciated, though in different ways, by experts and non-players alike. The overwhelming success of the BBC's television series Pot Black - especially when seen in colour - is merely a reaffirmation of the spectator interest inherent in the game.

Billiards, in contrast, had none of these advantages. Since there were only three balls there was not a great deal going on at the table, it was not visually stimulating and the skills required were such that an expert eye was needed to appreciate them fully. Finally, the rules were extremely complex.

……

Yet there was no professional snooker championship at that time, even though there had been an amateur competition for ten years. One day Bill and I were bemoaning the fact and I said to him: 'I wonder why the Billiards Association doesn't stage a championship. It doesn't make sense.'

Bill answered simply: 'Well, perhaps they would if we put it to them.'

Bill was a first-rate organiser and not a man to let the grass grow under his feet. So I immediately found myself drafting a letter to the BA&CC and drawing up conditions which Bill and I thought would be suitable for staging a championship. It was as Bill had said. The Association fell in with our proposal and fairly soon afterwards issued the conditions and invited entries. The first professional snooker championship was born.

It was held in May 1927, just after my failure in the billiards championship in March. But, apart from myself, the leading professionals steered well clear of this presumptuous event. For the first four or five years the contestants were players such as Tom Carpenter, Fred Lawrence, Joe Brady, the Irish champion, Tom Newman's brother Stanley, Alec Mann, a Birmingham pro who was making big breaks in local games, and Albert Cope, the manager of the Midland Hotel billiard-room in Birmingham. In the final I met another leading light, Tom Dennis, who had a billiards club in Shakespeare Street, Nottingham, and it was there that we played our match of 31 frames. But despite Tom's home advantage I won by 20 to ii and so took Britain's first professional snooker title.

Quite what I had won apart from the title was not immediately apparent. The entrance fee had been set at ten guineas each. To offset this, it is true, there was my share of the gate receipts during the three-day final but since the competition was in its infancy we did not feel it appropriate to make swingeing charges and so all that remained for me was £6 10s.

What of the entrance fees, which by rights should also have been mine on winning the title? Well, the Billiards Association were chronically poor and so they used all the money themselves  - to buy the trophy!

After the Second World War, when I retired after twenty years as undefeated snooker champion, many friends of mine were bitterly disappointed that I was not given the trophy outright. However, when it became clear that it was not to be, a great friend of mine and supporter of the game, Austin Cams, had a whip-round among some of his friends and had a reproduction of the cup made which they presented to me. The original trophy that I and my brother pros bought out of our own pockets is still being played for.

It would be unfair to disparage the snooker title merely because it did not immediately thicken my wallet. In fact it was one of the turning points of my career. Although the achievement merited only the odd paragraph in the papers it did give me a title to tack on to my name, and that was good for business.

On the other hand, though, I was not so besotted with snooker as to forget about billiards. What I wanted - in an ideal world! - was both titles. And yet again I felt that this time, in the impending 1928 championship, I really could beat Tom Newman, who still seemed my likeliest opponent since Willie Smith was under contract to Burroughes and Watts and was not deigning to enter the competition.