the spicy side such as "The Sultan's Harem," or the
shocker-type like "The Hanging of Mrs. Rogers."
The Rogers pictures scored something of an arcade
box-office record when they drew 2,400 pennies
tone machine in a New York arcade during the first
three days of showing.
large city in America to cater to the demand for
cheap flash entertainment.
Past Arcade Glory
Some idea of the past glory of the arcades can be
discerned from one operated by the Automatic
Vaudeville Company on New York's 14th Street.
[Figure 5] Here hundreds of coin devices were
pulling in pennies, and the management found that
coins were actually clogging the machines. To meet
this collection problem a series of tracks (boxed in)
were run beneath the machines, and each machine
was connected by a steel pipe, running from its coin
box, to the roof of the boxed passage. The base of
the pipe had a drop door, and eight electrically oper-
ated cars were run on the tracks. As a car passed
beneath a machine, it automatically opened and
closed the drop door to receive a shower of pennies.
After having made its rounds, the car traveled down
an incline to the manager's office where if passed
over a catch which released the bottom and allowed
the coins to pour down a chute to the safe. Each
machine in the arcade was numbered, and slugs
bearing corresponding numbers were periodically
placed in the machines. When a numbered slug did
not show up in the penny collection, the manager
knew that the machine was out of order.
The most profitable arcades were those operated
on a chain basis, such as the Automatic Vaudeville
Company and Mills Amusement Company, which
had locations scattered in cities and parks through-
out the country. These concerns could engage in
large-scale buying or manufacturing, and the
Automatic Vaudeville Company actually controlled
the Grand Rapids production of phonograph cabi-
nets. Chain locations could exchange machines,
pictures, records, and signs to give their arcade new
blood. Material circulated from one spot in the
chain to another, and, by the time it had rotated thru
the circuit, it was sufficiently fresh to pull in a new
stream of coppers at its original location.
The smaller arcades lacked these advantages,
and they depended on new attractions or dressed-up
machines to give their locations much-needed nov-
elty. Thus, the drop-card subjects ran a bit toward
Early Manufacturers
The bulk of the arcade machines were manufac-
tured by Caille Bros., Detroit, the Mills Novelty
Company, Chicago, and the William Rosenfield
Company, New York. [Figure 6] Basically the
Penny Arcade devices were quite similar, but their
manufacturers made attempts to give them a differ-
ent appearance or a new claim. Electric shockers,
for example, instead of merely inviting patrons to
see who could absorb the most electricity, began to
advertise that the machine was beneficial for
headaches, neuralgia, rheumatism, and all nervous
disorders! Caille Bros. Modernized the lifting
machine, which was merely the reverse of a scale
mechanism, by bringing out a Tower Lifter, in
which the tugging customer would light a series of
electric bulbs on a tower and ringing a bell at the top
when the highest score was registered. The Mills
Company called its perfume vender "Whiffs of
Fragrance," offering a choice of not one but four
different odors, while the Roovers Bros. in
Brooklyn substituted a colored nameplate for the
single aluminum strip in their die-press. [Figure 7]
The Exhibit Supply Company, of Chicago, brought
out new series of novelty cards for vending
machines, and fortune telling devices were re-chris-
tened "Gypsy Queens," complete with Oriental cos-
tumes, drapes and colored lighting.
In 1905 the Penny Arcade was meeting the prime
need of the new century for inex-pensive mass
entertainment, and it saw no need for innovations.
The new city workers had no money for the rela-
tively expensive theater, and language barriers
operated against the immigrant population. The
few coppers they could spend for amusement went
to the arcades. But suddenly he flood of pennies
pouring into the arcades was slowed by two devel-
opments. As the Penny Arcade had been standing
37