Clutching Hand



Known affectionately by operators as 'Old Groper', Hawtins' Clutching Hand was an imaginative and futuristic take on the rotary merchandiser concept. The large octagonal cabinet furnishes four stations from which players control the polished aluminium arms and clutching digits to grab prizes from the revolving mirrored disc. Of course, the shiny fingers lack the purchase of their fleshy counterparts.


Hawtins  
1938

Added to Diggers on 22/05/17

3 thoughts on “Clutching Hand”

  1. penners2

    Lovely to see this, the hands were modelled on my Granny, Kathleen Hawtin. It has always been something my mother had told me about but I had not seen it until now.

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  2. penners2

    My mother also wanted me add that it was her Father Ernest William Hawtin, born 1903, brother of Frank and Percy, that invented most of the machines including this one.

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  3. pennymachines Post author

    Welcome to the site penners2 and thank you for those interesting comments. I’ve added them to the Hawtins company biog here:
    and copied them over to the Forum here.

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