Ann arbor pinball museum11/18/2023 Some of the machines date back to the 1930s. He says that about 98 percent of his machines were broken when he acquired them, but he is mechanically and electronically adept, so he got all of them up and running. Harrell’s collection includes more than 200 machines, and about 100 of them will be on display at the museum. But even with the $5,000 in hand, he will be sinking more of his own cash into the project.įor starters, the building needs a new roof, which he estimates will cost about $15,000, plus new flooring. He’s reached his goal of $5,000, although the campaign officially runs through Aug. ![]() Harrell, who has been collecting, repairing and refurbishing pinball machines for about 20 years, launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for the museum project. ![]() The hall closed in April when that post merged with another in South Lyon. The museum, which is aiming for a mid-September opening, is technically in Green Oak Township, in the building formerly occupied by VFW Hall Post 1224. The Ann Arbor area has just such a someone - Clay Harrell, who has taken on the yeoman task of rehabilitating an old VFW Hall and turning it into the Midwest Ann Arbor Pinball Museum.Īnd in that respect, it will be a rarity: There are only a handful of pinball machine museums in the country, says Harrell - one each in Las Vegas, San Francisco, Seattle and Asbury Park, New Jersey. So it makes sense that someone would want to open a pinball machine museum, to celebrate that history. So, at this point in the history of American popular culture, most pinball machines are rightly viewed as cultural artifacts from bygone eras. So even though there has been a resurgence in the sale of pinball machines in the last decade or so, the vast majority of those sales have been to individuals, not bars or arcades. Kevin Ransom | For There once was a time when any self-respecting beer joint or rock 'n' roll club in America echoed with the “ding-ding-ding” sounds of pinball machines - a time when their flashing lights and elaborate artwork were regular, visually-striking elements of the bar-scene interior landscape.īut when video games came along in the 1980s, the popularity of pinball machines in bars began to wane, mostly because video games were easier to maintain: Unlike pinball machines, video games weren’t loaded with moving mechanical parts. ![]() His pinball machine collections includes more than 200 machines and about 100 will be showcased at the museum. Clay Harrell has turned an old VFW Hall in Green Oak Township into the Midwest Ann Arbor Pinball Museum.
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