Roman head information please

[Anglobritish]

Now I read your description of your machine, you say there was a roll over on one of the star wheels, that tells me it is probably a British machine, because when we operated these machines on the Fairgrounds (Carnivals) in England we moved from town to town every few days, so we did not want a machine to pay out that much.

Freddy Bailey

[watlingboy]

In the 80's and early 90's lots of English machines were brought into the US. These were mainly Mills and Jennings machines. The denomination badge was usually changed and they were sold. We were still coming out of the depression in the 30's and 50 cent American coin machines are very uncommon. Skill stops are very uncommon on American machines but very common on British machines. So if you find a 50 cent 30's machine with skill stops or numbered reel strips or country reel strips, it is probably English which is not a problem but you should know what you are buying because foreign coin machines sell for less than American coin machines.

Watlingboy

[JHSS-1944]

Freddy thanks again for additional information & I'm hoping you find that p.o. card image for me.
Waltingboy, thank you too for your information.
right now , I'm o.k. with it being either a U.S. or British played machine.

I pulled out my copy of that eras manual from Mills..... 1) found mine my machine has a few items "Mills marked", one of which = MLB 501B, which the manual parts list has as ... "pay out slide cover, 50 cent Bell ..... (for)... $2.00". parts list has a lot of parts Specific for 50 cent play, Which really surprised me !!
who was walking around then with these coins in their pocket ???

this is my theory (might be wrong), that company, Samson novelty, bought some 50 cent machines from Mills , since it was closer to the penny coin they were to use, less modifying of the parts but, no doubt still modifying. the base plate is also marked & stamped 50 cent.

my issue now is just trying to figure out what pays what looking at these reels. I own a F.O.K. (1925), so no issue what fruit combination pays what.
on these Number reels , there is only 10 numbers per reel , & no clue which number combination pay what.


Now I also need some quality photos of the skill stop parts. mine is missing 8 pieces (not counting the screws). I doubt I'll be able to hunt those parts down. But need the photos to better under stand what fits where & rough idea on the size of the parts , as I might have to make these from scratch.

does not have the J.P. or Award token holder either but, currently not so worried on those parts yet, Plus I really don't think I''ll find those any how.

Again , Thanks to every one for providing information to me on this nice old machine !!!

happy hunting everyone. jeff H.

[Anglobritish]

Jeff,
Here is an award card for the totalisator Reel Strips, it is not the one for your model, but it is the same awards and winnin g combinations. Also Mills Novelty Co made machines for their distributor on the English Old Penny, obviously they must have used the same tooling as the 50 cent, because it is the same size, only the 50 cent coin was a lot thicker. Also find attached the Samson Gold Award that was used in the Mills machines, because most of the Mills Silent models were made with escalators, only tells me that yours Roman Head model with a gooseneck was made for the U.K market.

I think in the coming years, European machines will become highly collectible amongst the American collectors, once they get more educated about them, Caille, Mills, Jennings and Watling all had a strong presence in Germany, France and the U.K. prior to the outbreak of World War II. Even Pace tried to break into the European market, but with little success.

In the early 1960's, there was a great movie made called "Borsolino" starring France' two leading film Stars, Alon Delon and Jon Paul Belmondo. they portraid the rise of two French gangsters around the early 1920's in Marsellies, prior to this movie being made, the Film company discovered a warehouse full of Brand New Watling Rol-A-Tops and Pace Comets that had been confiscated by the French customs in the early 1930's, these machines were still in their shipping crates, after they were used as props in the movie, they were sold to Bernard Dewitt, a dealer based in Paris, Bernard sold them to various collectors around the World.

Hope I have enlightened you a little.

Freddy Bailey


Freddy Bailey

[automaticpleasures]

Well done Freddy- good reply.

I can't understand the prejudice against supposed 'English' machines in the States- weren't they all made in the same US factories using the same equipment and materials and by the same people, at the same time as machines made for domestic use in the States in the 1930's? The only difference being the coin entry and slides? And then in the 1920s, and the 50's following draconian anti gambling legislation in the States weren't thousands of machines made for domestic US consumption dumped at giveaway prices on European shores? Then in the 70's and 80's many thousands of these so called foreign machines repatriated by the container load and reconverted back to US coinage? So why the price difference? It seems daft to me.

Likewise with the patenting system I discovered a number of early patents that are classed as English and therefore ignored in the States, when the patentee was in fact American and had travelled to Europe to earn their fortune, and by the same token a number of patents classed as American which were in fact taken out by English/European patentees who had travelled west to earn their fortunes!

Things should be appreciated on their own merit not according to some artificial national stereotype. Perhaps Watling's should be reduced in price because Tom Watling was Scottish by birth. OCH AYE THE NOO!!!

[JHSS-1944]

Freddy..... where would I be with out you ??!!
you know your stuff, well being in the business all these years, you should.
Thank you , Thank you for the images !!!
saving all them for sure. one would assume that these reel strips might be rare today on any machine, with them later being replaced for fruit ones over there & here.

Well ,I know what combinations to play to see what's what. Thank you again !!!!
I already own Lord Sega in 6d, & might pick up a Aristrocrat club master this week end in 1 p. of course , I don't own any British coins for either..... The 6d is close to a U.S. nickle, but again, the nickle is thicker ,so not the same pay out.

this right here is why non U.S. machines , bring less money in the U.S., hard to play / enjoy them If, you don' have the correct coins.
jeff

[Anglobritish]

Jennings Bingo Belle 6d play.jpg (8.41 KiB) Viewed 6850 times

Jeff,
When I was converting the American models in the late 1950's, I always tried to get the 10 cent models, it was much easier to convert the escalators and you could just file out the slides a little. the sixpence coin was the same thickness as the 10 cent coin. The Old English penny was the same size as the 50 cent piece, but the 50 cent coin was thicker than the penny, so as the payouts got hight after the 5 coin payout, the slides would pay one extra coin or even jam the slides up.

The Lord Sega was the first front door opening machine, it came in two models the Lord Sega on English sixpence (See attached brochure) and The Britania on Old English Penny, Both Sega and Jennings made machines in the 1950's for the U.K market, Sega with the "Lord Sega" and Jennings with their front door opening model "The Comet". Mill Bell-O-Matic Corporation did make the first modern day models for the British market with their High Top 777 model this had a one piece glass win dow for the viewing of the reels, a plastic award card and had Formica sides on the cabinet.

But because The Mills company was strongly connected to the American Mob, they did not have a strong distributor, in fact Tony Carolla a Mob family chief from New York sent my late friend of 50 years David "Gabe" Forman to England to start a company called Las Vegas Coin Ltd, David Forman was also "protected" by the British gangster Albert Dimes, this led to the British Home Office deporting David Forman, and The Mills Bell-O-Matic Corporation with no solid U.K. distributor, thus allowing both Sega and Jennings to get a strong foothold on the British fruit machine market.

If you go onto to the British Ebay site, there are numerous British coins for sale very cheaply, I have a box of flawless British Old Pennies that were sent to the Jennings company when they were producing their "Comet" model.

Keep up the good work, as the European machines have quite an history in the coin machine collecting market, and hopefully will become more of desirable to the American collectors in the future.

Freddy Bailey

[JHSS-1944]

thanks again Freddy.
looks like this is a brit. machine. on a 8 coin pay out ,I only got 5.
seems all the Segas I've seen here for sale (not many) ,if they use to light up, they don't now. all of it has been pulled out.
Now I know that the voltage here VS there is different, so you could not "just plug it in" But, still would be nice to know what was used & where. then try to rework it in the U.S. voltage.
my Sega was repainted (badly I might add) black & gold. the gold was low quality & also looked terrible next to the chrome. so I repainted the gold area in dark red.
In my opinion, the Sega parts were better made than the same Mills parts. The owner was told he could not take it back to Canada , so he sold it to me. it looked nice & a good price.
will be tinkering with 3 different slots this weekend...... mainly minor stuff.
jeff

[Anglobritish]

When Sega first started shipping machines to the U.K in the late 1950's, they had already started making all of the parts for the Mills Bell-O-Matic Corporation, in fact they were the Exclusive distributor the Nevada, one of the only legal states to allow slot machines, it is interesting to hear that you think the Sega parts were better quality than the original Mills parts, they certainly had a better finish to them, but the Japanese had not yet mastered the case hardening process, so the parts did not wear as good as the original Mills parts.

Many people think that Sega copied the Mills machines and ripped off the original Mills High Top 777 model, that was not the case, Although The Mills Novelty Company had been the largest slot machine manufacturer in the World, even prior to the introduction of the Johnson Act (The banning of the interstate shipping of slot machines) they had financial problems, and sold off a complete set of tooling to my late and very close friend Marty Bromley founder of Service Games-Sega, who in turn started producing slot machines for World distribution to the U.S military installations around the World. Marty formed many companies to both manufacture and distribute Sega machines in several countries, the Sega Bell was the first machine produced in Japan and later assembled in Germany for the European market, prior to that time Service Games of Japan built the Sega Bell model and shipped them to Service Games (Nevada) Inc, a subsiduery company who was the Official distributor of The Mills Bell-O-Matic Company then based in Reno, Nevada.

For the past several years I have been writing a book based on the life of Marty Bromley, and although the book is based on his exploits in his life, it is fictional, more of a James Bond style of character, anyone who knew Marty as closely as I did, would smile at the thought of such a book, he really was a real life James Bond type of character, who was at one time one of the richest men in the World, the book is called "The Lone American" and will be going into print within the next 18 months.

Your machine is probably a genuine Sega light up model, but could also be a copy, as several companies in the U.K copied the cabinet style of the Sega light up models, also when Marty first brought these models to the U.K. another company called The Chicago Automatics Supply Company in London did do the conversion of the lighting systems to suit the U.K. market, your machine is probably one of those machines.

Enjoy your Sega machines.

Freddy Bailey

[Anglobritish]

Hi Jeff,
can you post a couple of pictures of your Sega machine, I could then verify if you indeed do have an original Sega model. See the attached pictures one is a Copy of the Sega Light-Up produced by Mandry Brothers who were bought out by Mills, the second is a Serial No. Plate for the Sega Bell produced by Gunter Wullf in Germany Also one of the Sega Britannia made for the old English Penny, and the last is an original Sega Bell made for the U.K. market on Old English Penny.

Freddy Bailey