Morgan Stanley employees were engaging in a little after hours bonding (ties optional) while playing a game called "cornholing" in Cadman Plaza Park Thursday. While the name of this game has serious problems, apparently it is quite popular in states like Ohio. (See the PlayCornhole web site.)
According to the Cornhole Portal (!), a Bavarian cabinet maker named Matthias Kuepermann invented the game in 1325. At that time, corn was tied into small burlap bags and used as a unit of measure equal to roughly a pound. To this day serious cornholers use pound bags filled with corn (others just use bean bags). A slanted box across the way has a six-inch hole that you have to try to throw the bag through. It's harder than it looks, from the way the Morgan Stanley guys were playing.I don't know if this is a joke (UPDATE: I'm pretty sure it's a joke...), but according to the Cornhole Portal, owing to cornholing's wood requirements, the unbridled popularity of the game resulted in the deforesting of much of middle Europe in the 14th century.
Photos by MK Metz
I live in Brooklyn but often go to Ohio to see friends and family. I've played this game many times and it's a lot of fun.
ReplyDeleteThe history link mentions using corn in Bavaria in the 1300's in bags that were tossed. Pardon me, but wasn't corn in the New World only until the late 1400s?
I think the Cornhole Portal comments are a bit tongue in cheek. They had me pretty much all the way, though.
ReplyDeleteSturtus: what we call "corn" is actually maize. Before maize made its worldwide debut, "corn" was a generic term for all grains. Even grains of salt as in corned beef. I need to go outside more.
ReplyDeleteFrank, good thinking. I used to know that.
ReplyDelete