Paupa & Hochriem...

I must preface this article by making it perfectly clear that I not a fan of restored machines. I will trip over a room full of squeaky clean machines to make my way to an original example every time. Patina tells a story that is hard to reconstruct with a restoration. But alas, every once in a while the story told by the condition of an item is a horror movie rather than a feature film. What can I say? Sometimes you have to make an exception. Let me introduce you to mine.

By 1918 the coin operated gaming business was well established. Finding a machine from that time period is not particularly remarkable. However, machines with a sports theme were just starting to come to the marketplace. That brings us to the Paupa and Hochriem Baseball machine in my story.

I initially came across this relic on an online auction site. The price was by no means low, and the condition was by no means good. Or fair, or even poor. But like the last puppy in the last crate at the local animal shelter, it somehow picked me rather than me picking it. After ruminating for a few days I entered the opening bid and resigned myself to the fact that I may not get it. So much for that plan. A few days later it showed up on my doorstep. Believe it or not I was disappointed before I even opened the box. Buyers remorse was very real, and I had not even laid eyes on it yet.

But alas, this derelict was now mine, and I accepted the responsibility for its care. Being the aforementioned purist when it comes to original condition I was at a real crossroads with this one. As much as I loved the untold story of a vendor changing the theme of the machine over the years to keep it fresh and pulling in pennies, I could not get past the felt feet and spider web vibe surrounded by retina scorching yellow. This one had to be restored.

Being the google-ninja that I am, I tried to do as much research as possible before breaking out the tools. Unfortunately, information is hard to come by one hundred years after production. Even searching for online images only resulted in what I believe to be two different machines. I figured the machine was rare, but having only two images to work with was putting a damper on my optimism. Fortunately a U.S. Patent search turned up some original drawings for the machine, and got me to the point where I was confident that I could eventually wind up with something true to the original.

If this machine was predominantly made of metal I would feel confident in my abilities to strip and refinish it. Of course, this machine is made of wood, and thus I had to enlist the help of my good friend Bob Charboneau. Bob is an early baseball aficionado, and has a collection of baseball coin ops of his own. He was enthusiastic about the project and took it on with jaded optimism, or more accurately, with pity.

The first order of business was to determine how to strip it. It was then that the history started to reveal itself. Looking the cabinet over revealed not one or two coats of paint, but seven! Seven coats of Latex paint were painstakingly removed from what was eventually discovered to be a mahogany cabinet. The paint had done a remarkable job of preserving the wood, and had not soaked into the mahogany like oil based paint might have. Just getting to this point validated my decision to restore the machine. More stripping followed by careful disassembly fortunately revealed no serious issues other than a slight chip in the porcelain output tray, and the absenteeism of the goofy baseball guy whose job was to catch the ball.

In regard to the goofy guy, I knew I was not going to find an original piece for such a rare machine, so that left me with the option of improvising with period correct baseball items such as Cracker Jack toys or pewter figurines, or with creating the piece from scratch. After spending a month searching for anything period correct and baseball related, I resigned myself to the fact that I had to create a replacement.

Armed with Photoshop and a grainy digital image of the machine, I zoomed in on the fielder and slowly created an accurate rendition. Although I was tempted to improve upon the original circus-like look, I stayed true to the original and sent it to the local chain store photo lab for printing. I was delighted when the finished product came back better than I expected. With some creative mounting on a suitable substrate capable of surviving repeated hits of a ball bearing, things were finally starting to come together.

The painting of the playfield was straightforward, and I sourced a period correct Indian head penny for the sight window. Although not original, I added a baseball player to the bottom left of the playfield just to keep the area from looking quite so empty. A polishing of the trim pieces brought the project to a close. The machine now works as it should, and serves as one of the centerpieces of my collection.