First Picture - The first machine, as it says, is a Watling Rol-a-Top Coin-Front (it had several models), which was introduced in 1938. It was made by the Watling company that also made all those penny scales located everywhere in the 40's and 50's. It's a highly desirable machine. The original name was Rol-a-Tor, which apparently was trademarked by a refrigerator company, so, under threat of suit, they changed the name.

Slot 2 and 3 (same machine)- This machine is known as the Cross Diamond. While looking for 1950is than the Art Deco of the 1930's, this machine was actually introduced in 1931 by the Mills company. The first feature you should notice is the knob in the lower right and the diamond shaped windows. This shows it is what's called a FOK (Front OK). It was an attempt to avoid anti-gambling laws by making this appear as a mint vendor rather than a slot machine. When you inserted your coin and pulled the handle, you could turn the knob and receive a roll of mints. The diamond shaped glass on each side allowed you to see there were actually mints in the dispenser. The machine didn't hold many rolls of mints because they were largely unnecessary, as mostly they went unclaimed by the gambler who really wasn't interested in buying mints. In many jurisdictions this sham didn't fool anyone - it seemed only to fool those police, DA's, and judges already predisposed to permit gambling.
Also note the two jackpot windows. If a patron won a jackpot and left, this 2nd jackpot showed the next patron the he would get a jackpot if he played. It was designed as an incentive to keep the machine in play.

Picture 4 - This is the Mills "High Top" Bonus Bell introduced in 1949 (I'm actually older than this puppy). For a strictly mechanical machine it had the really cool graphic bonus feature, although because of mechanical slot physical limitations that bonus would only pay out 18 coins. As you can see in the photo, the first reel shows a "B" in addition to the normal symbol. Other parts of the reel have the remainder of the letters which spell "BONUS". As you play the machine, if the very next letter needed to spell "BONUS" comes up on the first reel, it advances the counter on top of the machine. Once the player spells "BONUS" he gets an added bonus of 18 coins. If you quit the machine and walk away, the "BONUS" doesn't reset, it continues to advance, thus giving the player an incentive to keep playing.

Picture 5 - This is a Mills 1933 Mystery Bell "Castle Front". It used the newly developed, at that time, Mills Silent Mechanism, which was more reliable and quiet than it's predecessors. The "Mystery" comes in that when you hit a single cherry you got a payout of 3 coins. Up to this time you needed two cherries for this payout. Additionally, to add to the mystery, the single cherry didn't show up on the payout table. Players flocked to them like suckers thinking they had found a broken machine and would take the casino for a ride. All is not what it seems - Even with the single cherry payout of 3 coins the machine still only returned 65% to 85%. No much compared to today's standards.

Picture 6 shows one of my personal favorites. It's the 1936 Mills Futurity Bell. It's claim to fame was that it counted each coin played. If you didn't get some winning combination in 10 plays it would give you all 10 coins back. Once a hit was made the counter would reset to zero. Looks like you can't lose, huh? Think twice. It was meant to look like a can't lose insurance policy, but it had a relatively high hit frequency of very low payouts. Like most casino games it's a negative advantage for the player. It paid back in the neighborhood of about 85%, and a lot of joints further increased their take by "bugging" one of the bars so you physically couldn't hit a jackpot.

The bottom picture is of the 1946 Mills Golden Falls. These are extremely desirable as collectors items. It was in the middle of the movement from Art Deco to 1950/60's drab, and possessed a very understated beauty. It also sported some mechanical improvements to the Mills Silent Mechanism from the 1930's. All it had was the, by now, standard jackpot, but it was considered very reliable and easy to play. The Golden Nugget ordered several hundred customized versions from Mills. Now there are thousands of those customized versions available. The couple hundred spawned babies in the 50's and 60's and there are tons on fakes on the market.

Thanks, Von, for sharing these photos. God, I love slots.