Amusements and Slot Machines
Postcard of the Marine Arcade, Great Yarmouth, c. 1900
Great Yarmouth Museums
Interview with Nick Pownal about Great Yarmouths amusements
By Richard Dade
Great Yarmouth is renowned for its amusement arcades along the seafront. This photograph shows Caesars Palace. Today the amusements contain highly sophisticated computer games machines.
In this interview with Nick Pownal we are reminded of how things have changed over the years.
"They were rather more primitive slot machines than they are today but they were all the same sort of things sort of giant bagatelle like things to put a penny in and bat the balls around. Probably the most popular things were you put the coin in and flick the trigger and the steel balls had to go into certain cups and things like that... went round in a sort of spiral...?"
"Some of them did all sorts of things like that and there was one machine I was fond of where you put the penny in and had five shots at a cat sitting on the wall with a pistol I was quite good at that and they had shooting galleries just like the fair where they fired short 2 2 ammunition which wouldn't be allowed today"