25 North Main

You’re driving down Broadway in your Model T and turn onto North Main Street. The street is lined with cars – also mostly Model T’s – but you luckily find a spot right in front of the Eagles Club, just a few doors down from Broadway. You park the car and walk over to the building next door. As you enter, you can hear loud voices and the sound of bowling balls crashing into pins. Just inside the door, you head down a dark stairway that opens to a big brightly lit room with six bowling lanes filling the entire space. Cigar smoke hangs heavy in the air. 25 or 30 men, all wearing long-sleeved, white dress shirts and ties, are either bowling or waiting their turn to bowl. Several young men work frantically at the far end of the lanes, setting pins up and rolling balls back on the return tracks. The Merchants League is bowling tonight, and the league leading Joe Smiths are taking on the second place Broadway Cleaners. You find a seat behind the bowlers in the spectator area. Should be some good bowling tonight.

 

Looking to capitalize on the increasing popularity of bowling, the Eagles Club in Council Bluffs let a contract in July of 1916 to build a new building directly north of their current building on North Main Street for the purpose of installing a bowling alley. The Cowles Brothers, proprietors of a cigar store on Broadway, had already taken a lease to operate the establishment.

In 1916, the only other bowling alley in Council Bluffs was Friedman’s, located at 724 West Broadway. Abe Friedman had just opened the 3-lane bowling alley in May of 1916, in the former Willow Springs Brewery tavern building, after the tavern was forced to close due to a change in the prohibition laws.

The Cowles Brother’s establishment opened at 25 North Main Street on January 8, 1917. It had seven lanes on the main floor and room for an additional six lanes in the basement.

January 7, 1917, Council Bluffs Nonpareil

In what historically seems to be a common theme, in 1919, a group of bowlers decided that they would like to run a bowling alley. The group formed a corporation for the purpose of operating the Cowles bowling alley. They named the business, the Council Bluffs Bowling Alleys. The incorporators were John S. Gardiner, Edward G. Cowles, Henry Meyer, Andy Gohlinghorst, A. Gordon, H. Tank, Richard Groneweg, and Herman Linden.

March 1, 1919, Council Bluffs Nonpareil

Just two leagues bowled in the 1919-1920 league season at the Council Bluffs Bowling Alleys, each with eight teams. As there were only seven lanes, the leagues had to split their matches into two nights. The Merchants League floored four teams on Monday and four on Tuesday, while the City League bowled on Thursday and Friday.

Unfortunately, for the bowlers and the business, in February of 1920, the building in which the bowling alley was located was sold to the Gilinsky Motor Company, a used car and auto accessory business, who would occupy the main floor, forcing the bowling alley to move all their equipment and furnishings to the basement, where only six lanes would fit. The bowling alley reopened on March 25, 1920, in the basement.

One year later, in March of 1921, the Council Bluffs Bowling Alley Company was bankrupt (also a common theme in bowling alleys) and had to give up their property to satisfy their debts. This is the list of forfeited property as printed in the Council Bluffs Nonpareil: Twenty-seven bowling balls, 6 pin setting devices, 59 good pins, 40 damaged pins, 6 alleys, and one alley not in use, one cabinet containing 25 lockers, 45 chairs, one counter, one ice chest, 12 Turn Pike cigars, two San Zemo cigars, 7 cans Bull Dog Smoking tobacco, one can of Tuxedo Smoking tobacco, five nougat bars, one package Juicy Fruit gum, two packages Yucatan gum, one Bunker bar, one hammer, two screw drivers, one wrench, one cigar and tobacco case, one cash register, one tobacco clipper, one cigar clipper, 47 bottles of soft drinks in ice chest, 15 bottles of Near Beer in case, one clock, two benches, 4 score boards, 7 cuspidors, two floor brushes, one floor mop, 3 ball racks.

Myron Stunz, a well-known Omaha bowler, and the proprietor of the Farnam alley in that city, was the next proprietor of the Council Bluffs Bowling Alleys, opening for the 1921-1922 season. 1921 also marked the beginning of the first women’s league in Council Bluffs, with Mrs. Myron Stunz in charge.

Three years later, the bowling alley on North Main Street had a new owner in Charles E. Sessions, a local contractor. He named the business the Clean Sports Bowling Alleys, and on opening in September of 1924, he stressed that, “the place will be a model of cleanliness, catering to lady bowlers as well as men”.  Four leagues were in place to start the 1924 season on Session’s six alleys. In addition to the six-team Merchants league, there was the Knights of Columbus fielding a six-team league, the Beno store had a four-team league, and there was a four-team women’s league.

August 21, 1924, Council Bluffs Nonpareil

Bowlers at the Clean Sports Bowling Alleys were, in November 1929, the first in Council Bluffs to form a City Association chartered by the American Bowling Congress. The first president was E. H. Brown. Melvin Remde and Clifford Lloyd were named vice presidents and Oliver Sealock was made secretary and treasurer. Five leagues were represented: Merchants, City, Industrial, Union Pacific and Knights of Columbus.

Clean Sports Bowling Alleys was the location of the first annual ABC sanctioned city bowling tournament in Council Bluffs in the spring of 1930. Entered were twelve five-man teams, twenty doubles teams and twenty-eight singles entries. Entry fees were $1.75 per event. The winners of the team event were the Joe Smiths, with a 2766 score. Doubles winners were John Turnland and E. Larsen with 1215. H. Wade won singles and all events, with 599 and 1698 totals.

The 1929-1930 league season would be the final one at Clean Sports Bowling Alleys. In the fall of 1930, Broadway Recreation Parlors, Ed Delehant’s all new 10 lane bowling center, opened at 6^th and Broadway, providing a new home for Council Bluffs’ bowlers. Dave Marshall, the manager at Clean Sports would assume the same position at Delehant’s new establishment.

In later years the building would be home to a shooting range, an archery range, a skating rink, a Good Will store, multiple auto dealers and repair shops, including Russ & Jacks, Goodyear, Knudsen Auto, and Auto Craft. Following that it was a real estate office, then a Gold Bond stamp redemption center, then Penney’s Toy Shop and finally, in 1971, a boxing club.

25 North Main Street was demolished in 1972 and 1973, along with the rest of the buildings on North Main Street for urban renewal.

Knudsen Auto Service sign in 1950 marks the location of the former bowling alley. The Eagles Club is next door to the right and the Water Works office is the building next door to the left. Broadway is the cross street at the top. From a Nonpareil photo from the Council Bluffs Library Special Collections.

Former bowling alley location in May, 1969. The building was built in 1916. From the John Ingraham Photo Collection in the Council Bluffs Library Special Collections.

Eagles Lodge at 21 North Main Street in May, 1969. Former bowling alley building just to the left. The Lodge building was completed in April, 1913. From the John Ingraham Photo Collection in the Council Bluffs Library Special Collections.

Former location of the Eagles Lodge, the bowling alley building, and one other building. The Water Works building temporarily still stands in the upper left. January 2, 1973, Council Bluffs Nonpareil.

Current view of the block where the Eagles Lodge and bowling alley building stood. From Google.