Automatic Age

THE AUTOMATIC AGE
Vol. 5
CHICAG O, S E P T E M B E R , 1928
No. 2
New Coin Machine Operators’
Association Making Great Strides
By O. C. L IG H T N E R
A t last the coin machine operators
have an organization such as they
have always wanted. It is not an
organization
dominated
by
New
York, or Boston, or Detroit, or Chi­
cago.
It is an organization in which ev­
ery section has equal representation.
It is not an organization com ­
posed o f five or six men re-electing
themselves to the offices year after
year.
It is an organization o f the great
body o f operators in which the o f­
fices must go from year to year to
the leading men o f the industry.
Several attempts at organization
have been made in the past and all
o f them failed. The new organiza­
tion has more paid members in three
months than any previous organiza­
tion ever did have.
Some want to know why the A U ­
T O M A T IC AGE cast its lot with the
new organization. W ell, the fa ct is
the old association really had no or­
ganization. It provided that all the
offices except one or two was to be
held by Chicago men. Members were
assessed $5 a year but were not al­
lowed to vote. No outside member,
that we ever heard of, renewed his
membership the second year and no
local association ever reaffiliated the
second year.
The great m ajority o f Chicago op­
erators themselves saw the injustice
o f this procedure and are aligning
© International Arcade Museum
themselves with the new
tion.
organiza­
The biggest and best men in the
industry are officers o f the new or­
ganization. And they are not there
fo r graft or personal glory but fo r
service to the industry.
Any one who cannot choose be­
tween Wm. Sheade on one hand and
Wm. Gent on the other has some­
thing wrong with his mind and heart
and judgment.
I f Sheade is a representative o f
the type o f leadership we have in
this industry we ought to be ashamed
o f ourselves.
W e are trying to get the industry
on a higher plane. We are trying
to get proper public recognition. W e
are trying to get new blood in the
industry and capital interested in the
different types o f machines coming
on the market.
They come to the convention and
go away disgusted. W e have been
doing ourselves a grave injustice dur­
ing these years we were patient with
Sheade and his crowd hoping against
hope that they would fulfill their
promises to broaden out their organ­
ization and get the better men o f
the industry into the offices.
But as long as we handed them
the big profit o f the Exposition on a
silver platter to pay exorbitant sala­
ries and expenses o f the bunch to
the conventions they were not going
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