Either way, he walks every fairway.
Riley brings the same patience and persistence – and goes through almost as many steps – in his other main occupation in retirement: crafting custom pool cues.
With tolerances in the thousandths of an inch and the need to adjust to the sometimes finicky characteristics of exotic woods, the work can be exacting, intense and, at times, monotonous, he admits.
At those moments, “I just have to get away from it.”
Still, the list he keeps of his cues – with the names of their owners – keeps growing.
And like Springfielder Steve Schuler, one of Riley’s repeat customers, it’s now in its mid-60s.
“It’s all about the feel of the hit – the sound of the hit,” Schuler says of the two Riley-made cues he owns and that have changed his approach to collecting.
Schuler has owned four high end Josh brand cues and a $2,000 McDermott, the last of which he gave to a son-in-law after getting one of Riley’s cues as a gift.
“I couldn’t put it down,” Schuler said.
So, he bought a second and now finds himself “tormented” over which to use. That’s a real problem because regular players like to develop monogamous relationships with their cues so player and cue can feel a deep level of trust in difficult situations.
Credit: Bill Lackey
Credit: Bill Lackey
Don Bowling, another regular at the tables at United Senior Services, first saw Riley’s sticks there and told himself, “I’ve got to have one of those.”
Although he has won tournaments with his, Bowling also appreciates them because he is a woodworker himself and is familiar enough with the process to recognize Riley’s craftsmanship.
“Absolutely gorgeous,” he says.
Riley’s long apprenticeship in the craft started in 1962, when he was christened “Jack the Rack” for racking balls at the Cue and Cushion, then associated with Springfield’s Top Hat restaurant.
He eventually became an understudy to Clarence Neumann, man who racked balls in East High Street billiards in Springfield March 19, 1954, the night Willie Mosconi ran 526 balls in a straight pool exhibition. (The record that stood until earlier this year.)
Neumann taught Riley how to set up and re-cloth tables and replace ferrules and tips of cues before eventually turning the business over to him. Using lathe skills learned in an early job at Miller Engine Company, Riley fashioned new wood shafts, then butts and other parts. Over the years, including seven running Riley’s Fastbreak pool hall while putting his daughters through college, he accumulated the equipment and skill required to try cue making.
The first of seven he has fashioned for family members was for youngest daughter and had about the same gestation period all the cues do.
“If I started in January,” Riley said, “I’d be done in September or October.”
Most of that time would be spent waiting for the woods used in various parts of the cue stick to dry.
They have to dry after being worked because if the wood does not have time to shed moisture, it will warp. And no one wants a warped pool cue.
Sitting at a lathe, “I take off 10 or 20 thousands (of an inch) at a time,” he says.
Credit: Bill Lackey
Credit: Bill Lackey
Starting with a piece that resembles a squared off chair leg, “I turn it down until it’s almost round, and then let it rest a bit.”
The amount eventually taken off roughly the same – about 250 thousands from the back end of the butt, angling to about 850 at the joint, where the back part of the stick and the thinner front shaft screw together.
Making a connection point there that’s straight and true is one of the big challenges.
The kind of wood he works with is mostly a matter of looks and depends on customer preference.
“Zebra wood warps,” Riley said, while coca bola and bubinga tend to be more stable.
“I like lacewood,” he added, as well as Osage orange, purple heart and red heart.
“I don’t care for ebony, because it’s hard to work with” – and cracks -- but favors padauk and loves the look of curly maple.
He also talks bells-and-whistles with his customers, sometimes adding decorative discs between sections and inlays in mid-cue.
Both because it cracks and the trade in it is sketchy, Riley avoids ivory, using camel bone, a more stable substitute.
Inlays, whether of wood or bone, “are probably the hardest” part of the work. They are done by cutting out forms on the front portion of the butt and gluing the inlay wood to it in matching alignments around the stick.
From there, he machines the joined woods, to the point that their surfaces match up on the surface of the stick.
“If the puzzle pieces don’t fit right, you have a glue line (showing between the two kinds of wood), and I don’t like the look of that,” Riley said.
If the inlay involves a series of points spread along the stick, getting their end points to line up is also a challenge, and it rankles Riley when they don’t."
“I like to sell a stick that’s perfect.”
In fact, he usually takes a customer on an imperfection tour of a cue before accepting money for it, with stops at every miscue along the way,.
“Like I told that one guy: Listen, you don’t have to take this stick. I’ll make another one. If you’re not happy with it, I don’t want you to take it.”
So far, he’s failed.
“One guy said, ‘I’d rather have it that way. That’s how I know it’s hand-made.’”
Once he even failed miserably.
His customer not only refused the offer of a remake, he went on to pay Riley for the cue, then gave it back to him.
He knew it to be the first cue Riley made and that it would be special to him, an indicator of how Riley and his customers get to know one another in the process of making a cue.
“I’ve never shot with it,” Riley said. And although some day he may, he’ll never sell it either.
Nor does his wife, Virginia, expect him to give up cue making, despite its exacting demands.
“I know he gets frustrated, but I’ve never seen him in a bad mood,” even when he has to take a break.
“He’s not a throw-it, slam-it, cuss, yell kind of guy.”
Riley just takes his cues and most other things one step at a time.