Pacific Pinball Museum facts for kids
The Majorettes pinball machine at the Pacific Pinball Museum
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| Established | 2004 |
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| Location | 1510 Webster Street, Alameda, California, USA |
| Type | Pinball machines |
| Collection size | 1,300 Pinball Machines |
| Founder | Michael Schiess & Melissa Harmon |
The Pacific Pinball Museum is a special kind of museum where you can play the exhibits! It's a non-profit organization, which means its main goal is to teach people about pinball, not just to make money. Located in Alameda, California, it has over 100 playable pinball machines. You can play games from the 1940s all the way to today.
The museum is filled with cool, hand-painted murals and old-fashioned Jukeboxes. It also has fun educational displays. The museum's goal is for visitors to "Play & Learn" at the same time.
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How the Museum Got Started
The museum was founded in 2004 by Michael Schiess. He used to design exhibits for other museums. In 2001, he started collecting pinball machines. He felt that other museums didn't do a great job of showing pinball's history, so he decided to open his own.
He started small. At first, he set up 14 machines in a rented room and put out a jar for donations. He called it "Lucky Ju Ju." As it grew more popular, it became a non-profit in 2004 and was renamed the Pacific Pinball Museum. In 2009, the museum got bigger. It added 40 older machines with wooden rails and classic "wedge head" designs. The museum also has a gift shop with pinball-themed souvenirs.
What Can You See and Play?
The museum has about 90 pinball machines ready for you to play. They are set up in order from oldest to newest, so you can see how the games changed over time. In total, the museum owns over 1,100 machines! The ones not on display are kept safe at a nearby building.
When you pay to get in, you can play the machines all day. You can even leave to get food and come back. The oldest game is a Montague Redgrave Parlor Bagatelle from 1879. A bagatelle is an early ancestor of pinball.
Special Machines in the Collection
- Humpty Dumpty: You can play this important game from 1947. It was the very first pinball machine to have flippers!
- Transparent Pinball Machine: Built in 1976 by the museum's founder, this machine is see-through. It lets you watch all the mechanical parts work as you play.
- Bally Bumper: This is a very valuable machine from the 1930s. It was once taken by police in Oakland during a time when some people thought pinball was too much like gambling.
- Modern Favorites: The museum also has popular modern games like The Addams Family and Twilight Zone.
Special Exhibits
Besides the playable games, the museum has exhibits that teach you about pinball history. These exhibits show how the game evolved from 1879 to the 1930s. The museum also creates special exhibits that are on display for a limited time.
- Pointy People: This exhibit looks at a cool art style from the mid-1960s. The people drawn on the machines are very angular and abstract. It was a big change from the more realistic art used before.
- The Art of Arthur Stenholm: This exhibit featured the work of Art Stenholm, who drew amazing art for major pinball companies. He was known for drawing strong, heroic women on his machines.
- Gambling, Amusement, or Both?: This exhibit explores pinball's past. It looks at how pinball was connected to games of chance and how it became so popular.
- Pinball Style: This fun exhibit looked at the clothing styles shown in pinball art from the 1940s to the 2000s.
Traveling Pinball Shows
The museum's collection is so cool that it travels around the world! Machines, artwork, and educational displays from the Pacific Pinball Museum have been shown in other museums and galleries.
Some places the collection has visited include:
- Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland, CA
- Museum of American Heritage in Palo Alto, CA
- Phaeno Museum in Wolfsburg, Germany
- Exploratorium in San Francisco, CA
- San Francisco International Airport Museum
The Mural Program
The museum has a unique art project called the Mural Program. It started in 2007 when an artist painted a giant version of the art from a pinball machine called "Majorettes."
Now, a team of artists creates huge, hand-painted murals of classic pinball art. Each mural is painted on a large canvas, about 10 feet by 10 feet. They take hundreds of hours to complete. The murals are for sale, and the money helps support the artists and the museum.
The Pacific Pinball League
Do you love to play pinball? The museum hosts the Pacific Pinball League on Wednesday nights. There are four seasons each year.
The league is open to everyone, no matter your age or skill level. Even if you've never played before, you can join. Experienced players are happy to teach newcomers the basics. If you do well in the league finals, you can even get an official World Pinball Player ranking!
Images for kids
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A wide view of the Pacific Pinball Museum's Science Room.
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A look at the museum's "Oddball - Experiments in Pinball" exhibit.
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The Lucky JuJu Room at the Pacific Pinball Museum.
