One of the principals from the birth of the modern UK gaming industry whose company was to go on to have a major impact on the European market, Gordon Marks, has died in hospital in London after a long illness at the age of 90.
Only the veterans of the international industry will remember Marks, who was a director of Phonographic Equipment, the largest UK and European distributor in the late 1960s.
It was at a time when Britain’s 1968 Gaming Act opened up the market to amusement with prizes machines (AWPs) – today’s Category C games in the UK – and introduced them for the first time in pubs. But Marks was into the industry some time before that, involving himself with the import of gaming machines.
He was part of a team of extrovert personalities that grew the business, eventually merging with rival Ruffler and Walker to form PRW Sales, which later became Associated Leisure. His colleagues included Cyril Shack, Ralph Mandell, brother Basil Marks and Max Fine. There was also a young Michael Green on the staff.
Marks entered the industry as a jukebox operator with Cyril Shack and, after early successes, opened a distributing company named Bal Ami Distributors through Gordon’s friend Sam Norman of Balfour Marine, who had the rights to build AMI jukeboxes for Europe. That was a highly successful business and they added fruit machines upon the introduction of the 1960 Gaming Act.
Gordon Marks is survived by his wife, Barbara and two daughters, Judy and Gillian. His funeral was held on Monday at West Chapel, Hoop Lane Cemetery, Golders Green, London.
Freddy Bailey, who grew up with those times and who is now resident in New York, US, reflected this week: “I only spoke with Gordon two weeks’ previously on his 90th birthday. I told him I was gong to send him a box of cigars – he was famous for his cigars. He was one of the greatest characters I have had the privilege to know. Gordon and I partied around the world together; Gordon was on another planet.”
Michael Green commented: “He was a father figure to me and much of what he taught me stays with me so many years later. I did visit him a couple of weeks ago and he was soon laughing and joking about the old days and the great times we had together. The industry has lost one of its greatest salesmen. He is gone but not forgotten.”
