I didn't know what to expect as I hadn't ever attended such an event. First a little background. When I was a teenager my father worked in the avionics field and managed a shop at one of the airports in the Dallas/Fort Worth area for a guy named Ray Linsley who owned an avionics shop at Addison Airport.
Ray was as stereotypical Texan as they come. The man could work a bullwhip like there was no tomorrow. One year, much to my mother's dismay, instead of my father receiving a Christmas bonus Ray gave us 15 pinball machines in various states of repair (or disrepair as the case may be) of which he had collected over the years. He also collected jukeboxes but intended on keeping those. Also included in my fathers "bonus" was a Missile Command arcade game and a cocktail style "break-out" game.
Now, here we are, my father and myself, moving and setting up pinball machines in our garage. I can't remember all of the titles but we did have some of the classics which included Bobby Orr's Power Play, Strikes and Spares, Playboy, Eight Ball, all by Bally, and a Williams Hot Tip which was an early Williams solid state game. We did end up with a couple electro-mechanical games also but never touched them. About half of the games worked simply upon plugging them in. Sure they needed to be cleaned and conditioned but keep in mind, these games were only about 10 years old or less at the time so they weren't in bad shape at all.
I spent the next couple of years cleaning, polishing, and learning how to fix the mechanical workings of these things. One summer my Aunt and Uncle who operate a foster home in Washington State came to visit and long story short, my parents ended up GIVING them six of the pinball machines! Of course since they knew very little about repairing or working on them they were given six of the machines that I had spent the most time on! This included all of the games I listed above except for the Bally Eight Ball which was my fathers favorite and actually was upgraded in status to be allowed into the front den of our house out of the garage. That was quite an upgrade!
Fast forward several years later and I'm full-fledged into comic book collecting. I casually browsed eBay off and on over the years for pinball machines never really thinking that I would actually own any again. Low and behold I find a Gottlieb Incredible Hulk pinball machine. Not only had I never seen one before, but the seller was local! What could be more perfect than a comic character themed pin to go with my other hobby? I loaded up my son and went to see this machine all the while my wife "knowing" that I was going to end up coming home with the thing. Sure enough I now own the machine.
The machine isn't perfect by any means but for being from 1979 I was pleased with the condition and it looks great!
So back to a few months ago, I'm at this pinball convention and there I see, in person once again, a Bally 1978 Playboy machine! I couldn't stop playing it. Both my sons knew right then and there that it was going to end up going home with us. Sure enough, we loaded it up late that Saturday night and brought it home.
Within the next few days I will start posting about my "project" that I've started. Glad to be here and look forward to showing everything off!
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