Slot Machine History

Slot machines got their start when a man named Charles Fey created the Liberty Bell in 1887, and our fascination with them has grown ever since. The slot machine was originally created out of the idea of a poker machine. The inspiration for it was a poker machine that showed a hand, and if you won you got a free drink.

The Liberty Bell slot machine was the first one-armed bandit, and could not pay out. There were too many possible outcomes, so the machine couldn’t actually pay anyone. It had three spinning wheels with five symbols – and one of those was a Liberty Bell – hence the name. The biggest payout it would give was 10 nickels.

The machine soon became known as the slot machine, and people couldn’t wait to try them. Thousands of slot machines were being mass produced, but then they became illegal in many parts of the country. San Francisco made slot machines illegal in 1909, and Nevada followed suit that same year. By 1911 you couldn’t have a slot machine in California at all.

With Prohibition, the ban on slot machines got worse. So they started creating slot machines that were vending machines. You put in money and could win gum, cigars, eggs, etc. They even had slot machines that would give out a puff of perfume for women’ handkerchiefs.

Nevada then legalized slot machines again in the 1930’s, with mechanical slot machines taking the lead, and then electronic slot machines taking over in the mid 1960’s. The first video slot device came out in 1975, around the same time that Atlantic City was legalizing slot machines as well.
 

Back to Monthly Archive // Main Slot Machine News Index