C.O.C.A. Times

by John Peterson
Photo A
PhotoB
It is said love makes foo ls of us all. Normally such
assessment is made at the end of a relationship, not the
beginning. Hindsight is always so much clearer than
forethought. Experience is not necessarily the saving
grace, either. Otherwise, there would be no such thing
as remarriage after divorce. But what a sadder place
the world would be without love and the foo lish things
we do for it. Today 's tale is one such story.
Photo A is my latest acquisition. It appeared on Ebay
as a truncated five-day auction. The seller had done his
homework. The piece was correctly described as a "su-
per rare vintage Bussoz - Paris France 'Exclusive Au-
tomatics,' a construecteur coin operated arcade game."
The "super rare" part of the description was a bit of a
stretch but the attribution was correct. This is a Pierre
Bussoz roulette game originally named "La Girouette"
from the early 20th Century. The three spinning pan-
els were originally painted with barnyard figures (For
more information on these games, see my earlier article
"Twisted Sisters." COCA Times Volume 9, Issue I,
March 2008.) A number of these games were exported
to England where they were revamped to accept the
large British penny. The graphics were also changed
from animals to pin-ups. The name given this "new"
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