Saffron Walden

[longbobongo]

I was talking to a fellow collector about the auctions at Saffron Walden back in the '90s. I guess a few of you guys went back in the day. What were they like?

This was pre internet days so finding machines out in the wild must have been hard but I guess cheap if you did. How could the average person find out the value before Google?

He did say there was lots off good machines around back then that were new to the market.

[grabber]

I went to a few auctions there. I found them OK but no bargains. They were run by a man who also owns House on the Hill toy museum at Stansted Mountfitchet. I'm not sure why they finished but I think it would have been about 1998 or 1999 the last one I went to.

[pennymachines]

Some of the first dedicated slot machine auctions in the UK were held at Sotheby's Saltney Chester salerooms; later Bonhams placed them in their Pop Memorabilia sales and Christies and Phillips included them in their Mechanical Music sales. These early auction catalogues became the first useful price guides, although values changed fast (mostly in an upwards direction) at this stage. There was an amusement machine section in Lyle's antique price guides (afterwards Miller's Antique and Collectable Price Guides) which gave clues as to what was available but were a bit meaningless on values (which were submitted by the dealers).

The coin-operated machines section of the Exchange and Mart was worth a weekly scan, with regular dealers, like the Star Warehouse, advertising there, plus individual traders. Alan Goldsmith's early auctions were held in a marquee in the grounds of Knebworth House, before continuing for several years at an estate agent's saleroom in Saffron Walden. I bought and sold many machines there and there were certainly bargains to be found if you knew what you were looking for. A fair bit of trading also took place in the car park. The sales ended when the estate agent retired.

Other big events on the slot collector's calendar were the Arcadia exhibitions (three in total, organised by members of the Pinball Owner's Association), Jukebox Madness, the Copthorne Jukebox Show and, for the more adventurous, the Dutch "Rock Around the Jukebox" in Rosmalen and the Chicagoland show.