The "Trap Door" at The Jolly

There is still a "trap door" underneath a table in the main bar. Not many people see it, but when they do, they ask if it was for smuggling.

Well, unfortunately it isn't as exciting as that, but there is an intriguing story behind it.

Many moons ago, there was a darts team at The Jolly and a dart board was put up in the main bar. Unfortunately, the bullseye has to be 5 feet and 8 inches from the floor. If you have ever visited The Jolly, you will know that the ceilings are pretty low.

So, to get round the problem of not having high enough ceiling, they dug down into the floor, creating a pit deep enough for the players to stand in, allowing the bullseye to be positioned at the correct height!

One wonderful story recently told to me by a chap that used to play darts at The Jolly was that they used to play "International Darts". This involved a team playing a match and recording it onto reel-to-reel tape. They would send the tape to America and they would play back the tape, playing their game after every match. The results would be calculated and a trophy sent to whomever won.

However, one year, The Jolly were almost certain the American team were cheating so they hit record on the tape recorder, all sat down with a pint and just shouted out better scores than the other teams! The results were calculated and the trophy was sent to The Jolly!