The sale of over 100 lots of antique amusement arcade machines and fairground equipment at Goole, Yorkshire, UK, saw some high prices achieved.
The sale, on Friday, saw some of the famous collection brought together by the late John Gresham go under the hammer.
Gresham was a unique character, an escapologist and fire-eater who performed for years at circuses, music halls and fairgrounds in the UK. He died in 1994 but not before he had, in his retirement, put together his collection.
It grew so large that he bought the former Ritz Cinema in Pocklington, Yorkshire, to house it and it was opened at the Penny Arcadia, amusement machine museum. The museum closed after Gresham’s death and much of his collection was sold off, but his family retained a portion of it.
Among the pieces sold was an 1880s Polyphon music automaton, coin-operated, with nine discs that sold for £1,900 and an Esco US-made "flicker" machine for £350. Other pieces included an Edwardian oak-case stereoscope with "lady figures" that sold for £700 and a late 19th century US-made clam-shell mutoscope (pictured) by the American Mutoscope Company that sold for £2,700.
Fruit machines, novelty games, early video games, vending machines and fairground art were also sold.
The sale was conducted by Spicer’s Auctioneers of Goole.
