Coin Machine Review (& Pacific ...)

By H. L. MITCHELL
been called a racketeer. I've been termed
I 'VE a gambler.
I've been asked how much we "pay
wondered why a machine couldn't be constructed
to perform the same function, and profitably.
Finally, out of a lot of cogs and gears came the
off."
And all because I'm connected, in a sort of way, first coin operated device, a dial machine called
with the coin machine industry, the business that "Horseshoes." Then he drifted west and went to
has developed the use of coin controlled devices work on a new machine that would use the same
to the point where amusement, recreation, service principles but with the added feature of paying out
and the receipt of merchandise may all be gained an award to fortunate winners. It took time, and
once a stern-faced landlady threw him out for "mak-
by the drop of a coin in a chute.
Gentlemen, I'm no racketeer. I don't gamble- ing such a racket at three o'clock in the morning"
neither in coin machines, nor on the ponies, nor on (to which he meekly replied, "How did I know what
anything else you could name. I don't even bet time it was? My clock stopped.")
on the weather- particularly not in Southern Cali-
At last he had it. When the proper combination
fornia. Above all, the only pay-off with which I'm showed through a window a corresponding number
concerned comes at the middle and end of the of coins rattled down a delivery chute. He called
month when I get a salary check and go out with it "Liberty Bell." It was, as you doubtless suspect,
it to appease the merchants from whom I have a "slot" machine, and it was the foundation of a
new industry.
bought things.
Fey tried out his machine in a San Francisco sa-
Briefly, my connection with the coin machine in-
dustry involves the production of a trade magazine loon-of which, then, there were a number. The
which goes to a majority of the men in this coun- results were surprising, and he went at once back
try who own and operate coin controlled devices, to his shop to make more of them. Ship crews,
and pursuant to those duties I write and edit news drifting in to the Barbary Coast from Alaska~
copy and feature material, prepare advertising copy South America, Australia and the Orient found the
and layouts, build advertising and subscription pro- devices fascinating and played them ' almost to the
motions and, in short, do the numberless things cen- exclusion of other forms of amusement. Thus, from
tering not around the coin machine industry but a strictly moral viewpoint, it might be said that
around the publishing business. From that point the slot machine saved many a man from something
of vantage, you may be certain, I get a view of the worse.
Finally, after he had the town thoroughly cov-
coin machine picture as a whole that is obtained
by few actually in the business. It's an interesting ered, and had begun to place machines in surround-
ing ar6C1S, the job got to be too much for Fey and
picture.
If you want to trace it down you can find records he hired an assistant whose sole job was to go
of coin operated devices before the time of Christ. into the basement and sort coins. Ripley would
As early as 1825 someone in this country made a like this one, and it's true: In Fey's basement nail
machine for selling chewing gum. But, according to kegs lined the wall, bulging with coins- some full
existing records, the first modern coin operated de- of nickels, others full of quarters. And after he'd
vice of commercial importance was attributable to been at it for a while the hired man began to com-
a twenty-year-old English boy, one Charles Fey who plain about the quarter-kegs. It was so much trou-
now, at 76, lives in San Francisco. Of a mechani- ble, he said, to go through the big piles and separate
cal cmd inventive turn of mind young Fey crossed the two-bit pieces from the five-dollar gold pieces I
the Atlantic shortly before h is twentieth birthday
As interest in Fey's machine continued and in-
and settled in Wisconsin with a
creased the inventor built other
vision of bigger opportunities in
~ypes. From them developed the
'essentials of current advertising
America than seemed to exist in
practice. Obviously there were
his and London's Cheapside.
The first proof of hfs ability The Associate Ed itor's college fratern ity too many machines for one man
came when he conceived; created, as~ed for a story about the coin mach ine "' and a number of assistants to
patented and sold to a Chicago industry for publication in the fraternity's handle, particularly when the
manufacturer a beam scale. Then, national magazine. . That account is pub- head man was mostly interested
with the thousand dollars which lished he re to show the sort of publicity in creating. And men from other
his invention brought, he returned which the industry can have if it goes after parts of the country had seen and
to new fields. Punchboards were it, and above all, the sort of publicity that wanted machines.
popular in those days and Fey
is of real value to it.
(Continued on Page 22)
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