Read below about all the bingo Facts and some fascinating bingo History. Bingo has been around for nearly 500 years, so in comparison bingo online is a relatively new craze. But when bingo began it wasn’t quite the game that we all know. Here are some facts to impress your buddies with, while you’re enjoying a game of bingo online.
| 1530 |
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The earliest form of bingo is played in Italy, traced back as far as 1530. Back then it’s a lottery-style game, known as “Lo Giuoco Code Lotto” or "Lo Giuoco del Lotto D'Italia". It is still played in Italy every Saturday. |
| 1778 |
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By this time, word had spread to France, where the most intellectual and wealtheist of Frenchmen regularly enjoyed a good game of bingo. It called back then "Le Lotto". |
| 1880 |
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The craze reaches Germany, where the game is used in education to teach children about maths, spelling and history (in some areas, bingo online is used for education today). |
| 1929 |
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North America catches on, and the game now known as ‘beano’ is played at a carnival near Atlanta, Georgia. If the caller yells a number present on the player's card, they place a bean on the said number. When the beans form a straight line in any direction, the winner shouts ‘Beano!’
A New York toy salesman, Edwin S. Lowe, overhears someone accidentally yell ‘bingo’ instead of ‘beano’, and decides to rename the game ‘bingo’. |
| 1930 |
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Lowe hires math professor Carl Leffler to help him increase the number of combinations in bingo cards. Leffler invents 6,000 different bingo cards – it’s rumoured that Leffler then went insane. Good job he never played bingo online! |
| 1934 |
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A Catholic priest from Pennsylvania asks Lowe about using bingo to help raise church funds. As bingo is played in churches, the game soars in popularity. An estimated 10,000 games are being played every week at least. |
| 1968 |
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Under the Gaming Act of 1968, bingo is formalised in the UK. |
| 1986 |
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The National bingo game is launched in the UK. bingo online is still a speck on the horizon! |
| 2005 |
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More than 3 million people regularly play bingo offline, with numbers soaring in online bingo. |
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