I thought this was pretty darn interesting:

The early origins of Bingo can be traced back to the mid 1500s to the Mediterranean country of Italy. In 1530, after Italy's unification, the national lottery was formed. The Italian gentry, and thereafter the German nobles, were very excited about this lotto-type game and played it while entertaining large parties. The Germans added an educational side to the game and used it to teach students math, history and spelling.

The lotto game arrived on the North American shores in 1929 and was known by the name Beano. It was first played at carnivals in Georgia and was discovered by Edwin Lowe, a toy salesman from New York. Lowe had been drawn to the crowd at the carnival stand offering the game of Beano and he approached the man running the stand. Lowe was informed that the stand manager had found the game while touring Germany with the carnival troupe and it had grown on him.

Lowe decided to try out a home-version of Beano - he purchased some beans and made up a few cards with number combinations. His friends thought the game was amazing and the managed to draw quite a crowd. The story goes that one woman got so excited when she had filled her card with beans, that she got tongue-tied and screamed out the words BINGO, instead of BEANO. The name stuck and become known as Bingo henceforth.

Lowe became the chief marketer and producer of Bingo. The popularity of Bingo spread and soon Lowe was approached by a priest who thought that the game could be the perfect fundraiser. Lowe quickly understood that he would have to start mass-producing the game in order to keep up with the orders. With the help of a retired mathematician, Lowe produced 6,000 number combination cards and was all ready to set the Bingo world alight. By the mid 1930s there were an estimated 30,000 weekly games of Bingo being played across the United States.

__________________
"You gonna bark all day, little doggie, or are you gonna bite?" - Mr. Blonde from Reservoir Dogs