A mid 1960's French "babyfoot" table football, by ZAK3. With working pull rod mechanism for ball release, and abacus scoring. In working order. The history of table football: Patents for similar table games date back as early as the 1890s in Europe. However, foosball's origins go back to 1921, when Harold Searles Thornton from the United Kingdom patented the game (UK patent no 205,991 application dated 14 October 1921 and accepted 1 November 1923) He invented the game due to the popularity of fo