by Anglobritish » Tue Dec 16, 2014 6:26 pm
Hi Joe,
Sega did not own Mills, they just bought up all of the parts for the High Top models that were in Reno, Marty Bromley never bought any sinking ships, he just played the part of the salvage company. previously he had bought a set of tooling from The Mills Industries, before Mills moved to Nevada because of the Johnson Act, that was in 1951, prior to building the Sega Bell (High Top) model in Japan, and later assembling it in Germany for his company Club Speciality of Panama, he built his Sega machines in the Gunter Wulff factory in Berlin, one, to take advantage of the tax incentives given to Gunter Wulff by the German Government and two,to supply the U. S. military bases in Europe where Marty operated, also the British slot machine market was opening up and Sega was the first there with new slot machines.
Mills and the Mob tried to get new Mills machines (See picture) into England in 1958, but Gabe Forman who started Las Vegas Coin Ltd in England in 1958 for New York Mob Chief Tony "Ducks" Corolla got deported in 1960, I was a lifelong friend of Gabe Forman, he sadly died in 2006 at the age of 88, I was at his 80th birthday party on Long Island in 1998, (see picture of my gift to him).
Regarding your Mills Four Crown crown model, it was built by Mills-Bell-O-Matic in Reno in 1952, it was made to compete with the Jennings four reel Buckaroo model, It was a revamped Mills Extraordinary with four reels, they also built the Mills Super Star that was a cross between the Mills High Top and a Jennings Sun Chief. These were the last of the Mills conventional models, they later got into bed with Jennings and tried to compete with the New Bally Money Honey that changed the slot machine industry for the next 40 years. Now there is IGT and Bally all over again.
Although your machine as not got great value, if I was a Mills slot machine collector, I would want it in my collection. A generous price in todays market I would estimate around $1200.
Freddy
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