On March 6, 1930, faced with the desolation of the lingering winter in Hayward, Minnesota, postmaster R.E. Dewey and train station agent J.C. Hanson started a friendly game of pitching horseshoes to pass the time.

And pass the time they did, for five months and four days, playing five games of horseshoes a day in the longest match in history. The contest ended with Dewey's score 25,000, besting Hanson's score of 24,949.Pitching horseshoes, to see who can get the shoes to land around a metal stake, is a summer tradition.The horseshoe league at Coaldale's Rod & Gun Inn is a 60-year old tradition. While no matches are as epic as Dewey versus Hanson, the pitchers can throw past dark because of the lights.In preparation for the coming season, volunteers met there recently, using rakes, leaf blowers and shovels to clean the course of winter debris, and pounding in the stakes and backstops with sledgehammers. And of course, once the pits were cleared, they just had to throw a few shoes."The league runs in two parts, with the first one from May 5 through July 15 and the second season from July 21 through September," said Jim Matula, one of the organizers. "After each section we have a picnic for everyone, with catered food, and give out the awards."Registration for individuals is only $20 (call Matula, 570-952-4259). Then the individual names are thrown into a hat and drawn into teams. Anyone, men and women, over the age of 21 can register."You can't help but meet other people," Matula said. "It's competitive, but it's also a lot of fun."Matula said there are usually four to six teams, with six people on a team. Matches are held every Tuesday night, beginning at 6:30 p.m., and there are twelve matches a night. He'd like to see the registrants list grow, because there's room to expand with additional pits.Horseshoe Pitching's Growth as a SportSome competitions feature Quoits, which are rings made of metal, rope or rubber, thrown at a stake as are horseshoes. Which came first?One of the earliest references to the game comes from ancient Greece. Competitions were held for athletes who threw discs - similar to the discus thrown at track meets today. At first, distance was the sole goal; later, "target" stakes were pounded into the ground and throws were judged on accuracy.In the United States, in 1835, Henry Burden in Troy, New York, got the first patent for a horseshoe manufacturing machine. Horseshoe pitching, using shoes of uniform size, was on its way to becoming a well-organized sport. In 1881, the rules for the game were published.In 1899, the first horseshoe club was formed in Pennsylvania. In 1909, the first world championship tournament was held as part of a horse show in Bronson, Kansas.The tournament was won by Frank Jackson, who would win seven more world championships and still ranks fourth on the all-time list of world championship winners.