How the Slot Machine was Invented

How the Slot Machine was Invented

The traditional one-armed bandit fruit machine is an essential feature of any casino, and is found in bars, pubs, and both online and land casinos across the world. They can now be found online at sites such as Dream Jackpot. This gambling game is easily recognisable thanks to its famous slot reels depicting fruit symbols. Operated by depositing coins into a slot and beginning the game via a button or lever, the simple aim of the slot machine is to match three or more symbols in a pay line to win a reward.

When was the Slot Machine Invented?

The first coin-operated slot machine was created in 1894 by San Francisco mechanic Charles August Fey. Working on the prototype, Fey perfected his design to create the 4-11-44 the following year which proved to be a roaring success in his local saloon. Following the success, Fey quit his day job to pursue his dream and opened a factory dedicated to producing slot machines. Fey developed the first ever automatic cash pay-out slot machine in 1898, known as the Card Bell. Fey’s most popular creation was the Liberty Bell, developed the following year. Nowadays only 4 of these machines are still in existence after many were destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Fey and his competitors faced fierce opposition from the legal system and the church who deemed the fruit machine ‘immoral’. The city of San Francisco succeeded upon banning slot machines in 1909, but Frey designed machines without coin slots to work around this ban.

The Slot Machine We Know Today

In 1909, the Industry Novelty Company attempted to surpass the legal restrictions placed on slot machines by marketing their product as a chewing gum dispenser. This saw the company add the famous fruit symbols to their reels as representative of the different flavours of gum available to the player. In the following year, the Mills Novelty Company took this idea even further with the addition of a chewing gum symbol – a bar.

In the following decades, the slot machine soared in success in the US, despite a ban on gambling outside Nevada. After World War 2, the fruit machine was adopted across the world, and advancements in technology in the 1950s led to the development of exciting additions to fruit machines such as multipliers.

The Creation of Video Slots

In 1975, video slots appeared in Las Vegas casinos but were met with some scepticism by fans of traditional slot machines, who celebrated the sights and sounds of a mechanical slot game. As gambling laws relaxed, the numbers of video slot machines rocketed.

By 1994, the fruit machine had found its way into the world wide web, providing millions of users across the world with the ability to access thousands of games from the comfort of their homes. It was estimated that around 8 million people has taken part in online gambling by 2001.

With the development of mobile technology, the world of online casino has continued to surge and is a multi-million-pound industry. Users around the world can now find fruit machines on their phones, computers, bars, and casinos and have access to millions of unique and exciting games.