The WW2/Conversions Pinball Game List

Introduction
Methodology
What the List Actually Includes
Understanding the Codes
Notes
If You Have Updates...
The WW2/Conversion List
Observations
Statistics

Introduction

On this page you will find what I believe to be the most comprehensive list of pinball games produced or converted during the WW2 period. A lot of manual tedious scanning, checking, verifying, compiling, editing, guessing, etc. was done to produce this list. The starting point of this effort was the fantastic efforts of Donald Mueting and Robert Hawkins, who created the original Pinball Reference Guide back in 1979, and followed it up with the benchmark Pinball Collectors Resource ("PCR" - ISBN 0-9623962-0-6), published in 1992.

This book is the definitive list of every pinball game ever created. However, with close to 4,000 entries, it is not perfect nor is every game included (and in some cases, some non-pinball entries have made there way in). At the back of the book is a list of all games ever converted, including WW2 conversions. The list contains the name, manufacturer and date of the converted games, plus the names of the games converted from.

Methodology

I took this PCR conversion list as my starting point. I then used all of the Billboard magazines at my disposal and carefully scanned each page of each issue looking for potential updates. Each issue contained many ads from distributors, operators and manufacturers, listing newly created games and conversions or conversion kits, along with a vast amount of used equipment for sale. Occasional articles also mentioned relevant info related to games produced.

So, after much note taking, photocopying and PCR book referencing, I had my list of updates and additions, etc. My first objective was to take the existing conversion list as published in PCR and expand it slightly to include more detail on the games used for the conversions. Thus my list includes not only the name of the game converted from but also the manufacturer of that game and the year it was originally produced.

I was quite happy to come up with about 125 updates or additions to the original list. It is quite possible that I've introduced some errors or inaccuracies myself, but every update is accompanied by a specific Billboard issue and page reference, allowing the reader to come to his/her own conclusions where there is any doubt as to the validity of the entry or update.

What the List Actually Includes

I was uncertain as to what should be included in this list. Converted games only? All games from Sept. 1, 1939 to Aug. 1945? All games from Dec. 7, 1941 onward? In the end, I settled on all pinball games produced from approximately April 30, 1942, to Dec. 31, 1947, with the exception that any games produced in 1946 or 1947 had to be conversions (since they would be converting from the same pre-war game stock as earlier efforts in theory). The April 30, 1942 date corresponds to the date in which American manufacturing was shut down and totally converted to producing materials for the war effort. Hence, all games produced up to pretty much the end of 1945 are conversions or transformations of other games, although this is not known for sure.

For example, the Marvel ads never mentioned that they were converted from other games. Perhaps they were original? Folks who own a Marvel game or recognize playfield layouts could contribute some information here.

Understanding the Codes

Each entry in the list has a description field included in it. Although the field is free-format, there is a set format for describing updates and additions to the original Pinball Collectors Resource entries. If the list entry represents an update to the PCR list, the first character of the descriptions field will be an asterisk (*). This is followed by a series of one or more descriptive codes separated by commas to indicate what it is that is updated from the PCR book. The following codes are used:

new

this is a new entry that doesn't currently exist in the PCR list

date

the date that the game was first manufactured or produced or made available (in the case of a conversion kit).

from

the game converted from has been changed or added (when it was previously unknown)

mfr

the game's manufacturer field has been updated

name

the name of the game has been updated, where the PCR entry had it spelled incorrectly or had a minor deviation from reality (e.g. Whack the Jap instead of Whack the Japs)

Following the above codes, will be a space followed by the justification for the update. Universally this means the edition of Billboard ("BB") in mm/dd/yy format followed by the page number. If several issues were used to justify the updates, the other issues will follow separated by commas and spaces.

The above formatting and codes makes it possible to programmatically update any existing online databases. Other shorthand notation found includes "5bfpg" for "Five Ball Free Play Games". If this code appears it means the new entry was listed in an operator ad under that heading, meaning for all intents and purposes it should be a pinball game.

The manufacturer code id's used are the same as used in the PCR. Only one new code was added - SNA for Sullivan-Nolan Advertising.

Notes

It is important to understand that these updates are not cast in stone as being absolutely correct. They represent my best judgement only! Consider the following points:

• When setting the fields representing the original game manufacturer and date ("Old Mfr" and "Old Yr"), I used the most recent game produced in cases where there was more than one game with the same name. So if Whack the Japs was a conversion of Circus, it is assumed in the absence of other information that the 1940 Genco Circus was used for the conversion and not the 1938 Daval Circus.
• Common sense was used when finding new previously unlisted games. When an operator's or distributor's ad mentioned a pinball machine that wasn't previously listed, care was taken to determine if a) the name of the game in the ad was in fact correct, and b) was it really a pinball machine. There were countless cases where ads list games with incorrect names or abbreviations. There were also a lot of ads which lumped non-pinball games in with pinballs (e.g. they were probably arcade shooting games, etc.).

  For example, one late 40's ad by an operator named two potentially new games: "Old King Cole" and "Merry Old King". But common sense told me that these were most likely Gottlieb's "King Cole".

• If a potentially new game appeared in an operator's list of supposed pinball games, a check was done to ensure that all other games listed were also true pinball games.
• For the numerous entries in which the production date has been updated, this date must be considered in many cases to be the earliest reference date as opposed to the actual production date. So it provides a "not later than" bound on the date. Some dates were "improved" by as much as 3 years, while others were only modified by a month. Several other games had no date listed at all. Keep in mind that I do not have a complete library of Billboard magazines, so that some gaps in issues will provide less than completely accurate dates.
• There were several types of "conversions" performed, and all are considered valid here. Some companies took in old games and completely made then over at the factory. Other companies, such as Victory Games, produced kits allowing operators to revamp their own games. Then there were the "backglass only" conversions done by companies such as Glickman. While the conversion kits were targeted at specific existing models only, I did see one ad saying something like "Jap conversions of the above games $7.50". The ad listed about 100 pinballs, which leads me to infer than there could theoretically be hundreds of converted game permutations out there that are not documented here and may be "one offs"!!

If You Have Updates...

If you have any updates to this list, please let me know what they are! Let's make this list accurate.

The WW2/Conversion List

Sorry - this info is only included in the purchased version of the presentation. See the Info page for details.

Observations

A few observations about the list and some of the entries . . .

There were several conversions named "Bombardier". The P&S conversion from Formation is certain, but no evidence was found to accurately determine the validity of the other Victory Games conversions listed in the PCR (and note the PCR listed them as "Bonbardier"). The "Click" game is listed with unknown manufacturer, but Keeney made a Click in 1947 so perhaps this was theirs also? The PCR lists a Gottlieb "Five and Ten" game. I also found a couple of ads talking about this game, but found many, many more talking about "5-10-20" or "Five-Ten-Twenty". Were there in fact 2 distinct games, or are they one and the same? See the ad. The PCR entries for the early Williams entries, "Flat Top" and "Zingo", appear to be backwards in terms of the games they were converted from. The Chicago Coin "Gobs" game was listed even though it isn't a conversion. But it was produced in 1942 and corrects the name listed in the PCR as "Cobs". The PCR lists "Hit the Japs" as the last Gottlieb pre-war game. Was this really a Gottlieb game? I only found mentions of the game of the same name by Victory Games. It's interesting to see that Gottlieb made both a wartime and post war "Stage Door Canteen". See the ad from April 1945 on the left. Anyone ever seen the wartime version? I don't recall seeing it mentioned in print, although Russ Jensen did mumble something about the existence of a pre-war version to me once. Some of the one ball conversion games ("War Admiral" and "Whirlaway" specifically) appear to have had multiple creators. Sullivan-Nolan Advertising had ads listed for War Admiral touting how they would convert the games. But I'm not certain if they did this on a big scale using a kit from say, Bell Products, or if they created the conversion parts themselves.

Statistics

Who did the most conversions? What were the most popular subjects of conversions? The answers are at our fingertips given the above table and a little bit of SQL.

Most Popular Companies Having Games Converted

Bally wins here, but throw out Whirlaway and War Admiral conversions and the total would be 46 instead of 59. Genco was very popular in the period leading up to the war!

Most Popular Games Used in Conversions

From A to Z Exhibit Supply is the clear winner here, with Genco running second. I left out the Bally games used for Whirlaway and War Admiral, as there are uncertainties about these games (noted earlier).

Most Popular Conversion Producers

Victory Games clearly has the highest number here. However, this category is all apples and oranges. Victory created kits that you bought for $9.50 and retrofitted yourself. Glickman just supplied new backglasses with a new name and new artwork only. Bell, United and Westerhuas actually took games and revamped them in house as far as I know.

Most Popular Year To Convert Games From

As you might expect, the newest games were used for conversions. The unique games column eliminates duplicates. For example, Genco's 1940 Formation was converted into 4 different machines. It thus accounts for 4 of the 67 for 1940 in the total games column, but only 1 for the unique games column.

Last Update: August 12, 1996