News and Coming Events
Bonhams Sales
Laurence Fisher (head ofBonhams mechanical music dept.) contacted me shortly before
Christmas, and informed me that from this year all slot machine and coin-op items will
be concentrated at the Knowle sales, rather than Knightsbridge. This makes sense for
many of us, Knowle being more centrally located. Parking is also less of a problem at
Knowle, ( even though on my last visit I had to park about half a mile down the road, but
I did get parked). Higher value mechanical music items will continue to be offered in the
Knightsbridge sales. I shall, as usual, bring to the notice of readers any items of interest
coming up at the Bonhams sales nearer the time.
Hastings Pier
I was talking to an old friend a while back, and during the course of our conversation the
subject of Hastings pier arose. The pier has been closed for about three years now, due
to structural concerns. The owners (an offshore company based in Panama) seem to have
done a runner, and all in all, the future of the pier doesn't look good. There was some
hope that the pier would be taken over by the owners of the Grand pier, Weston-Super-
Mare, who have made several visits to Hastings to survey the pier. Unfortunately, last
November their engineers advised the cost of making the pier structurally safe would be
in the region of £25M, so the owners of Grand pier have said they cannot make a
commercial case for taking it on.
Some of you will remember I operated machines on the pier briefly in the late 1990s,
which was not one of my greatest ventures! The pier was, in my view, not commercially
viable then, and frankly I cannot see it being viable in the future. I fear that this once
great seaside pier could be facing a similar fate to the Brighton West pier (part of which
literally fell into the sea a few years back). I do wonder for how long our seaside piers
were expected to stand when they were built. Nothing lasts forever, and huge structures
built from iron and steel, standing in salt water will surely have a finite lifetime.
Hastings pier has stood for almost one hundred and forty years, so has perhaps had more
than a fair run for its money.
I shall be keeping a watch on developments during the course of this year, as the
structural integrity of the pier is deteriorating fast, and if it is to be restored, it probably
needs to commence pretty soon.
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