[FSPA] VBH CLOSED

[Van Doren, Lee]

Thanks Joe!

A little more history...  When FSPA lost it's founding location, Howie's in College Park, it was looking for a new home.  My wife at the time was playing volleyball at The (original) Volleyball House in Columbia.  She became friends with Paul and Judy and I noticed they had a pretty lame video-game only arcade corner.  I suggested to Paul and Judy that I could bring in a pinball machine or two if they didn't mind but it might irk the current operator.  They said they didn't care.  Oh, I also mentioned we had an orphaned pinball league...  "league, did you say?"  said Paul and Judy 😉.  [Trivia: first machine was my home game, Frankenstein]

It didn't take long before they booted the video game operator and I got some extra pins in so that we could get "the" league in there.  The video games were evicted and I put a token Neo Geo in their place 😊.

The league prospered but then VBH needed to move as they lost their lease in Columbia.  Once again we were homeless for a little while.  I found a bar just over the border in AA county where we all mustered together to move the pins to an UPSTAIRS lounge area.  That is where I discovered the heinous AA pinball regulations.  I elected to go incognito and not pay the fees.  I did lobby to AA about it but little did they care.  

The pins' revenue performance there was poor so we were soon evicted and homeless again.  Eventually VBH completed its buildout in the Elkridge location and we were reborn and grew bigger and better with more space.  I left the MD area and turned over operation to, well... the rest is more recent history 😉.

I am so happy to hear much enjoyment was had by all.  I miss those so so hot summer nights there.  Especially spending hours with Scott fixing up the machines... well, maybe more time spent by Scott.

Carry on, flippers!!
Lee (Van Doren)
               


-----Original Message-----
From: FSPA <fspa-bounces at fspazone.org> On Behalf Of Joe Schober via FSPA
Sent: Thursday, May 30, 2019 8:12 PM
To: FSPA main discussion list <fspa at fspazone.org>
Cc: Joe Schober <afljoeys at aol.com>
Subject: Re: [FSPA] VBH CLOSED

I'd like to take this opportunity to extend my thanks to all the league officers and players at VBH -- our current crew of Joe Kosack, Jake Peterson, and William Wulf, as well as the many others who contributed their time and energy to this league over the years.  VBH was our oldest league location, with 20 years of continuous play, so it's especially sad to see it shut down.  And although I'm pretty sure they're not on this mailing list, huge thanks also to the owners and staff of VBH itself, who were always very gracious hosting us at their facility.

--Joe
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