Balabushka’s History

Born in 1912, George Balabushka is a legend in the pool and billiards industry.  As a longtime pool enthusiast and woodworker, Mr. Balabushka is best known for the pool cues that carry his name.

Unlike so many of the cues that were being mass produced at the time, George Balabushka hand crafted each cue and autograph each cue he made.  The level of precision and quality Balabushka put out in creating each pool cue made them “must haves” for pool players around the world.  People would pay huge sums of money for original Balabushka creations.  Today, original Balabushka cues can only be found through auctions and private collectors.  Balabushka originals command prices in the tens of thousands of dollars.

While the name Balabushka has been commonplace in the pool and billiards industry for years, it wasn’t until 1986 that his name became synonymous with pool.  In 1986, the world was re-introduced to the world of billiards by Martin Scorsese, Paul Newman and Tom Cruise in the movie “The Color of Money”, a sequel to “The Hustler”.  All it took was Tom Cruise’s character Vincent Lauria excitedly asks “Is that a Balabushka?” for the world to take notice of the pool cues.  Ironically, the cue being represented as a Balabushka was actually a Joss pool cue.

Balabushka died in 1975, but his name continues to live on.  Balabushka was inducted into the BCA Hall of Fame in 2004.  While the original Balabushka cues are extremely rare, you can purchase replicas that have been endorsed by the Balabushka family.  While they are manufactured in larger quantities, the replica Balabushka cues continue to be extremely high quality and among the nicest cues on the market today.