Thanks folks for the info. The machine is an original 1938/39 cast iron Chrome Bell just as advertised in their literature. I will post with this some photos of the unrestored parts I am working on. It is chrome finish with the metallic red diamonds and the "bronzed" cabinet which is actually a hammer coat bronze paint on wood, bonnet and back door. The red diamonds are cast iron with copper plating topped with clear red lacquer.
My confusion is with the construction of the mechanism itself. The reel bundle is finished in a light bronze lacquer coating also and the mechanism is after degreasing lightly colored a bit with the same bronze finish. Some has been cleaned away over the years to reveal a normal cadmium plating over cast iron.
What I have never seen before is the fact that the mechanism base is (under the dirt and grime) solid phosphor bronze totally non-magnetic, not brass but a much harder phosphor bronze. I assume that when this machine production was stopped due to the war that the usage of bronze also ceased as it was a scarce war commodity (i.e. steel pennies and silver nickels).
The machine came out of a storage room from a VFW/DAV club and after I managed to use some jewelers tools to extract the broken key shank and have it copied by Dave Berten the cash box and jackpots were fairly full of silver quarters with the newest one dated 1956. There were even a handful of the old flying eagle quarters. To the best of my knowledge the only non 1938/39 item is the reel strips which had been replaced with the silver ones circa 1947.
I always feel like Sherlock Holmes with a new find. My query to the group is this base. Has anyone else ever seen a solid bronze mech base?
For fun a few pictures and when I am done with restoration I will post the finished product.