FIDDLING THE AMUSEMENT ARCADES

WHEN I WAS ABOUT 10 YEARS OLD

Photo: Scarborough Beach - 1960s

Scarborough seafront (UK) was has always been a mass of amusement arcades overlooking the beach, even more in the 1960s and 1970s, than today. The easiest machines to 'fiddle' were those that had fruit such as cherries, pineapples, lemons and the like on a roller wheel. (They became known as Fruit Machines) This was in the days before these machines were called one-armed bandits, but in essence, they were exactly the same.

We knew that the machines won every 9 times. It cost a penny to have a go on a machine (i.e. the OLD BIG PENNY before the UK went decimal) and the winning sequence was threepence, threepence, sixpence, threepence, threepence, ninepence, threepence, threepence, a SHILLING! This meant that the machine took about 72 pence revenue, and paid out 45 pence during each full sequence.

What we'd do is this: We'd watch a punter (usually a man and usually a tourist) playing on the machine. When it came time for the shilling payout, we'd shyly with puppy eyes (an act!) ask the man if we could have a go - and in most cases (because we were just kids) they'd allow us. We'd win the shilling (i.e. 12 pennies) and then run off happy. Meanwhile, the punter hadn't a clue what had just happened.

The best of it was that the same type of machines worked in exactly the same way across the length of the entire seafront. No only that, but other machines (such as horses running around a track) worked in a similar way and we knew the winning sequences. Of course, the managers of the arcades used to ban us from entering amusement arcades, but generally, we could always get into half a dozen, and come away a lot wealthier. It was nothing to win up to a pound in an afternoon - equivalent to £20 in today's money. I think we were the richest little urchins on the seafront.

Was it crooked? I guess it was, but we never saw it that way because we considered that the amusement arcade owners were just as crooked by 'fixing' machines to only win in a certain sequence, thereby ensuring they couldn't lose.