People of the Attractions: Striking Gold with Pinsetting Equipment

Call it luck. Call it fate. Sometimes, an event can change the course of a person’s life and span generations. For Bill Campbell Sr., that event occurred in 1956 when he was 14 years old.

An avid bowler, the owner of the duckpin lanes near his home came up to him and asked if he wanted to be a “pin boy,” referencing the young workers who manually set the pins between turns.

“Well, I was in heaven,” Campbell reflects on the job offer.

He got 8¢ per game, and, if he was lucky, the bowlers would roll a dime, a quarter, or if they were big spenders, a half dollar down the gutter as tips.
“I’ll never forget it,” the 82-year-old Campbell told me as he wistfully pointed to a yellowed photograph of him and other pinsetters. “They were very good days. That’s where it all started.”

With the advent of automatic pinsetting equipment, the job only lasted a couple of years. However, Campbell never lost his love for the sport. Years later, entrepreneur Jimmy Ryan bought the duckpin lanes and hired Campbell, who was a fixture there, to manage it. Married with two sons at age 35, he was back in the employ of the bowling establishment for a few years until Ryan sold it.

Campbell’s oldest boy, Billy, Jr., also fell in love with the game and cherished the first set of bowling balls he received as a youngster. Billy’s younger brother, Peter, became fascinated by the pinsetting equipment. A born tinkerer, he began taking the machinery apart at the age of 8.

Ryan bought additional locations and brought Peter on as a mechanic when he graduated high school in the mid-1990s. After observing his hard work, Ryan made Peter a manager of one of the bowling and arcade centers at 19 years old. Because he needed help, Peter coaxed Billy to work with him and lured Bill Sr. back into the industry to co-manage the location.

“We’re a tight family. We help each other out,” explains Billy.

The three Campbells remained with Ryan Family Amusements, and the brothers moved up the ladder in the burgeoning company. Billy and Peter became part of the ownership group. Earlier this year, Billy was promoted to president of the company, which now includes 10 family entertainment centers throughout New England. Peter’s three sons work for the company, and Billy’s children and wife have logged hours as well.

“Jimmy Ryan is a saint,” Billy says. “What he did for our family is incredible.”

The Campbells shared their story with me at one of Ryan’s centers on Cape Cod amid the clamor of rolling balls and clacking pins that has been the soundtrack of their lives. Retired at the end of 2023, it was the first time Bill Sr. had been back at the lanes, and the memories were overwhelming.

“It’s meant a lot to me,” he says as he gestures toward the bowlers and holds back tears.