Group of Williams bowlers<br>makes nationals annual event
Nothing will stop these ladies. Broken wrists, bad weather, even a heart attack have not kept Dorothy Willett, Grace Reid, Barbara Adams, RosaLee Olson and Eleanor Maillie from bowling.
In fact, the five Williams bowlers have gone to the Women’s International Bowling Congress national tournament most of their lives.
Maillie’s first nationals was back in 1958 in San Francisco. Willett’s first appearance came in 1962 in Phoenix. Olson, Adams and Reid first made it there in 1962 in San Diego.
“To me, you belong to a bowling family,” Adams said.
“We’re dedicated bowlers,” Willett added. “We love the game.”
Indeed they do love the game. Take Reid, who actually had a heart attack on the lanes. Amazingly, she completed her events and said she’s “still going strong.”
“I’ll keep bowling until I’m six feet under,” Reid said, “and I might be bowling there.”
Adams echoed those feelings about the game.
“As long as the ball and I can get to the foul line together, I will bowl,” she said.
Maillie broke her wrist a few years ago and was told by her doctor that she may never bowl again. She said her physician couldn’t believe it when he saw her at the bowling alley a short time later.
The ladies have each received plaques from the WIBC for their involvement in so many national tournaments. It’s a rare feat for a small town like Williams. For example, Flagstaff has only one bowler in their category of participation.
Willett, 77, has been to 31 national tournaments; Reid, 86, has been to 29; Adams, 66, and Olson, 85, have each been to 30 nationals; and Maillie, 75, has gone 28 years.
“We’ve been all over the country,” Willett said. “We’ve been from Hartford, Conn., to San Diego to Seattle to Miami and Kansas City, St. Louis and Indianapolis in between.”
The ladies have competed in several city, state and 500 club tournaments as well. They garnered so many trophies, that they took the took the plates off and donated them to the junior handicapped bowlers.
The ladies said they did keep the special ones, such as the first trophies they had ever won.
As many know, there was a bowling alley in Williams until just a few years ago, a closure which saddens all of them. They all compete in Flagstaff now.
Adams said Tom Bowdon Sr., opened the alley back in the summer of 1964 with a couple of leagues. Winter leagues were soon added.
When Willett first came to the area from New York, she bowled in an alley at Bellemont.
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