Fortune teller that gave you value for money

[coppinpr]

I've just finished work on this little chap, and I do mean little, stands just 24 inches high and 12 inches across. It's a late machine,1977, but it appealed to me and it needed work so I bought it. Common in the USA but perhaps not so much in the UK, this one is on 25c coins.

It was very hard to disassemble, surprisingly heavy and well made in the USA but I think never designed to be taken apart. Key parts like the knob, drum and dispenser seem to have either been heat fixed or push fitted through heavy plastic sleeves that have long gone solid. It was jammed with the hardest grease I've ever seen seizing up the rollers.

You certainly got your money's worth with this machine; you set your star sign and it delivers a scroll, double sided and 24 inches long crammed with info for your sign, for that month in that year!
Starscope were, at one time I believe, the biggest supplier of horoscopes in the USA, providing them for newspapers and radio stations as well as their huge number of machine locations. The scrolls were changed by either the location manager or a travelling agent each month who also changed the top box display card to the current month.

Luckily it came with at least a dozen scrolls for each star sign but I believe they are still available in the US. My machine seems to have dropped out of service in Jan 1981 as the top card and scrolls are from that month (the top card was so naff I made a general replacement and kept the original with the machine).
A great little vendor that I've really taken a shine to