State by State
Last update
06-14-2022
_ Missouri _
Best Place to
Play Pinball
Eat Rite Diner
With just two pinball machines, the Eat Rite might not have the
best selection in town, but those two babies are classics. Eight Ball, based
on the television show Happy Days, was the first digital pinball
machine to include ball-to-ball memory and went on to become one of the
best-selling games ever. Roller Derby, one of the few "bingo"
pinball games to be found in St. Louis, is completely devoid of flippers. Instead gamers punch colored buttons and hope to land
balls in winning configurations that pay off behind the bar (it's a
precursor to push-button slot machines). Eat Rite's management wants to
make clear that today the game is simply for amusement purposes and does
not pay out. That pinball's popularity peaked decades ago makes the
throwback Eat Rite -- hardly altered in its 60-plus years of operation --
an even better venue for the sport. With the beehived
madams slinging hash behind the counter and the jukebox tuned to Patsy
Cline, the pinball players at the Eat Rite might imagine themselves
transported back to the halcyon 1970s when pinball was king and the Fonz -- illuminated on Eight Ball's scoreboard -- ruled
the airwaves. Honorable mention to Beatnik Bob's in the City Museum (701 N.
15th Street, St Louis; 314-231-2489), which features plenty of old-school
pinball machines; but to play "em you must
first pay the museum's admission fee of $8 to $12.
_ State Tax
Stamps _
…on a Bally Broadway
http://www.crimemagazine.com/greenlea.htm
“In the 1950s, the Mafia in St. Louis had little power. The
south side of the city was dominated by the Syrian Mob (they were actually Lebanese),
headed by Jimmy Michaels, Sr., who was close to Buster Wortman,
the rackets boss in East St. Louis. Wortman was the dominant gangster in
St. Louis from the early 1940s through the early 1960s. In fact, there came
a period when Wortman (who didn’t like Vitale) sent his men into St. Louis
to smash dozens of pinball machines (bingos used for gambling) belonging to
Vitale. Vitale’s response was to tell the St. Louis Globe-Democrat that Wortman was crazy, and that if Wortman
wanted the pinball machine business, he could have it. And Wortman did in
fact take over the pinball-machine business (he had his own vending machine
company).”
…just let him have it`
~
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