, nicknamed "Katsy" and sometimes called the "First Lady of Billiards", was a Japanese carom billiards player who was most active in the 1950s. She was the first woman to compete and place among the best in the male-dominated world of professional billiards. First learning the game from her brother-in-law and then under the tutelage of Japanese champion Kinrey Matsuyama, Katsura became Japan's only female professional player. In competition in Japan, she took second place in the country's national three-cushion billiards championship three times. In exhibition she was noted for 10,000 points at the game of straight rail.
After marrying a U.S. Army non-commissioned officer in 1950, Katsura emigrated to the United States in 1951. There she was invited to play in the 1952 U.S.-sponsored World Three-Cushion Championship, ultimately taking seventh place at that competition. Katsura was the first woman ever to be included in any world billiards tournament. Her fame cemented, Katsura went on an exhibition tour of the United States with eight-time world champion Welker Cochran, and later with 51-time world champion Willie Hoppe. In 1953 and 1954, she again competed for the world three-cushion crown, taking fifth and fourth places respectively.
Little was seen of Katsura for the next few years. She made 30 exhibition appearances in 1958, and went on a one-week exhibition engagement the following year with Harold Worst, but did not compete in any professional tournaments. In 1959, she made two television appearances on ABC's You Asked for It, and one on the CBS primetime television hit What's My Line? Katsura returned to competition in 1961, playing a challenge match for the World Three-Cushion title against Worst, then reigning world champion, and was defeated by him. Katsura disappeared from the sport thereafter, only making a brief impromptu appearance in 1976. She moved back to Japan around 1990 and died in 1995.
Life and career
Early years
Masako Katsura was born on 7 March 1913 in Tokyo. Little is known about Katsura's childhood in Japan. Katsura had three sisters and a brother. Their father died when Katsura was 12 years old and she went to live with her elder sister and her sister's husband, Tomio Kobashi, who owned a billiard parlor. By 13 she was spending time in her brother-in-law's billiard room, and by 14 she was working as a billiard attendant there. Kobashi was a fine player and taught Katsura the fundamentals of various carom billiards games. Katsura also had a billiard table at home, bought by her family after she showed intense interest in the sport. Katsura practiced diligently, and began competing against Japanese men and beating them. At just 15, Katsura won the women's championship straight rail tournament of Japan. "Then I turned professional and began touring with a sister all over Japan, China and Formosa", said Katsura in a 1959 interview. Katsura's two younger sisters, Noriko and Tadako, also won the women's straight rail championship in other years. (Date of world championship provided here (1951 rather than 1952) is incorrect per hundreds of newspaper articles)
In 1937, Katsura met Kinrey Matsuyama, who had won Japan's national three-cushion championship multiple times. Matsuyama was also U.S. national champion in 1934, was the runner-up three other times and had four second-place finishes in world competition at 18.2 balkline prior to World War II. Matsuyama was impressed with Katsura and began teaching her top level play. By 1947, Katsura was a long-established billiard star in Japan—the country's only female professional player.
Marriage and titles in Japan During 1947 Katsura caught the eye of American serviceman Vernon Greenleaf (no relation to the pool and carom billiards champion Ralph Greenleaf), a master sergeant in the U.S. Army's Quartermaster Corps who had been in the armed services for 22 years. Katsura and Greenleaf first met in a Tokyo service club where she was giving billiard exhibitions. Greenleaf began taking lessons from Katsura and was quickly smitten with her. They were married on 30 November 1950, but never had any children.
At the time of their marriage Katsura already boasted two second-place finishes at Japan's national three-cushion championship; one from the year prior to their wedding. She claimed the runner-up spot for a third time the year of her marriage. About that time she accomplished the lofty feat of scoring 10,000 contiguous points at straight rail in an exhibition by the balls around the table 27 times over about hours. She stopped at 10,000 points only because it was a benchmark round number. In later years she said that her high run in three-cushion billiards (number of points scored consecutively in a single inning) was 19.
Immigration to the U.S.
In 1951 Greenleaf was transferred to a U.S. post from Haneda Air Base in Tokyo. He and Katsura, who spoke little English, set sail for the United States on the USS Breckinridge, debarking in San Francisco at the end of December 1951, just a few months before the 1952 World Three-Cushion Billiards tournament was scheduled to begin in that city on 6 March. Katsura had been conditionally invited to play at the world championship after Cochran, whose billiard parlor was hosting the tournament, had heard of her brilliance from Matsuyama. Cochran was an 8-time world champion having won the world crown at three-cushion billiards in 1933, 1935, 1937, 1938, 1944 and 1945, and at 18.2 balkline, in 1927 and 1934. Cochran sent his son, W. R. (Dick) Cochran, a naval officer stationed in Japan, to investigate and received back a glowing report that said (possibly to Cochran's annoyance), "this girl is better than you are!" Though the decision was ultimately in the hands of the Billiard Congress of America as tournament sponsor, they gave Cochran the option to invite her.
After Katsura arrived in the U.S., she gave a private exhibition for Cochran, who wanted to make sure she was as good as reported before finalizing the invitation. At that meeting she clicked off runs of 300 and 400 at straight rail, made in the words of Cochran "almost unbelievable shots" after switching to balkline, and showed high competence at three-cushion, consistently scoring. Cochran made the invite "final" and stated: "She's the most marvelous thing I ever saw... She's liable to beat anybody, even Willie Hoppe... I could not see any weak spots... She's going to give lots of those players fits." As a warm-up for the competition Katsura gave a number of billiard exhibitions during February 1952.
1952 World Three-Cushion Billiards tournament
First woman to compete for a world title
Katsura's participation in the 1952 World Three-Cushion Billiards title marked the first time that a woman had competed for any world billiards title. This was only ten years after Ruth McGinnis became the first woman to have ever been invited to play in any men's professional billiard championship (the New York State Championship of 1942). The defending champion was the then 64-year-old internationally renowned Willie Hoppe, who would retire later that year with 51 world titles to his name between 1906 and 1952 in three forms of carom billiards, three-cushion, (four sub-disciplines of) balkline and cushion caroms. Before the tournament, speculation had it that when Hoppe met Katsura in the championship in the to 50 points format, he would defeat her with Katsura still needing at least 40. After seeing her play, Hoppe said "she has a fine stroke and can make shots with either hand. I look forward to playing with her." The public was fascinated by the novelty of a woman player. Life magazine reported that "San Franciscans who did not know a cue from a cucumber crowded in to see her... Katy ... stole the show."
Tournament roster The 10 champions slated to play in the round robin format tournament were Katsura, her mentor, Matsuyama, favorite and defending champion Willie Hoppe, Mexican champion Joe Chamaco, Herb Hardt of Chicago, New York's Art Rubin, Los Angeles' Joe Procita, Ray Kilgore of San Francisco, Jay Bozeman of Vallejo and Binghamton's Irving Crane. The championship between the invitees was to take place at Cochran's 924 Club, with 45 total games to be played (each player to play every other once) over the 17-day tournament ending on 22 March 1952. The tournament was reported to have "The greatest billiard field since before World War II". First place earned a $2,000 purse (today $), plus thousands in exhibition fees. Following behind to eight places were prizes of $1,000, $700, $500, $350, $300, $250 and $250 respectively.
Detail of play On the second day of the competition, 7 March 1952, Katsura drew Irving Crane for her first match. They made quite a contrast as Crane was the tallest player at the tourney, while Katsura was described by reporter Curley Grieve of the San Francisco Examiner as "so small and doll-like she looks like a figurine in her flowing, gold-satin gown." Crane's main discipline was straight pool, at which he won numerous championships, including six world titles. The match was close, but Crane prevailed 50 to 42 in 57 . On 10 March, Katsura defeated Herb Hardt 50 to 42 in 58 innings. Katsura was significantly behind at one point but counted 15 points in five innings to take the lead. On 11 March, she lost to Chamaco, 50 to 35, but the following day Katsura upset Procita 50–43 in 63 innings, with runs of six, five and four. "Spectators exclaimed 'brilliant' and 'sensational' at some of her shots."
On 14 March, Katsura faced the undefeated Hoppe, losing 50 to 31 in 36 innings. Though Hoppe was a darling of the public, the crowd of more than 500 spectators was clearly rooting for Katsura throughout. The next day she faced her mentor, Matsuyama, considered the contender with the best shot at beating Hoppe. Matsuyama edged out his protégé with a close 50 to 48 finish in 51 innings. By the 21st inning Matsuyama held a 29–21 lead. Katsura battled back, the score 43–42 in her favor by inning 33, but Matsuyama ran three in the 46th inning, and Katsura could not close the gap. Mentor and protégé alike posted high runs of six in the match.
On 18 March Katsura trounced Art Rubin 50–28 in 58 innings. but was handed a worse defeat in her next match on 20 March, losing to Bozeman 50 to 18 in 52 innings. In her last match on 21 March, Katsura pulled off a 50–46 win against Kilgore in 61 innings. This was the biggest upset of the tournament. Kilgore, the "Giant Killer", was the only player other than Matsuyama who was considered to have a fighting chance at dethroning Hoppe. Between this win and her earlier win over Procita, Katsura had beaten the only two players in the tournament that had won their matches against Hoppe. That evening a separate exhibition match between Katsura and Kilgore was featured on KRON-TV, with commentary provided by Cochran. The next day the tournament concluded with Hoppe repeating as champion as he had so many times before. Katsura took seventh place, ahead of Procita at eighth place, Chamaco at ninth and Rubin at tenth. Above her were Crane at sixth, Rubin at fifth, Kilgore at fourth, Bozeman at third and Matsuyama as runner-up.
Following the competition, Jay Bozeman, said "We've found it hard to believe that a woman could actually step into the best billiard championship in the world and hold her own. Miss Katsura is one of the finest players I've faced in a world's tournament", while Welker Cochran, five-time holder of the Billiards World Crown, predicted: "Given another two or three years of American competition and she will be the world's champion.... Masako has opened a new field for women. Her presence has made the game attractive to women for the first time. She has the power of a man and strokes beautifully. Her maneuvers with the cue ball are fantastic. All she needs is a bit more experience and she will be unbeatable."
Exhibition tours