Charles Fey was the inventor
of the first ever mechanical
reel slot which was invented in 1895.
The car mechanic by trade, created
a simple three reel spinning
machine. The slot machine was
made of 100 pounds of cast iron
and featured 10 symbols on each
reel with a diamond, spade or
heart symbols on the reels in
addition to a cracked liberty
bell symbol.
The machine was pretty simple
to use, and if a player lined
up all three liberty bells it
would award a payout of up to
fifty cents, making it the first
of its kind. Although there
had been machines which were
dubbed games of chance predating
the Liberty Bell, they never
had the ability to actually
award a real payout.
Due to current laws at the time,
Fey was unable to patent his
machine and wound up renting
them to local saloons and pubs
charging a 50% commission fee,
additionally he used symbols
for free drinks and/or awarded
gum to get around the gambling
laws which prohibited gambling
machines.
As time passed operators were
having problems with players
cheating the machine by inserting
fake coins (also where the term
wooden nickels developed from).
To prevent this, Fey introduced
the first detecting pin, which
had the ability to distinguish
real coins from the fakes. His
slot machine became a massive
hit which led to problems of
supply and demand. Other large
companies approached him to
purchase the rights to manufacture
his Liberty Bell, but Fey would
not sell. Eventually an arcade
company named Herbert Mills
was able to produce a replica
to the Liberty Bell and named
it the Operator Bell which became
one of the first fruit slot
machines created. The only difference
between the two slots, other
than the fruit symbols was the
Operator Bell had a total of
20 symbols painted on each reel.
Eventually Charles Fey opened
up his own shop, named the Liberty
Bell Saloon located in Reno
Nevada. They provided a restaurant
setting with a complete slots
museum on the second floor of
the saloon. The museum featured
the original Liberty Bell slot
as well as a collection over
more than 200 antique slot machines.
After Charles Fey passed away
his grandsons took over the
family business however closed
the saloon in 1995. The original
Liberty Bell slot machine is
still available today, although
no longer in play the slot it
can be found at in a museum
in Reno Nevada.
| 
