Sho Me
About This Machine
The Sho Me pinball machine, produced by V.P. Distributing Company of St. Louis, Missouri in 1944, is a flipperless electro-mechanical (EM) conversion of Chicago Coin's 1940 game 'Roxy.' It represents the kind of wartime-era conversion common in the early 1940s, when manufacturers repurposed existing cabinets and mechanisms rather than building entirely new games.
As a flipperless machine, Sho Me predates the invention of the pinball flipper, introduced by Gottlieb's Humpty Dumpty in October 1947. Gameplay relied on tilting and precise plunging to guide the ball toward scoring targets, with electromagnets and mechanical relays controlling scoring rather than player-operated flippers.
Little additional information is available on the specific design, art, or theme of Sho Me. Its age, single-player format, and status as a conversion of an earlier Chicago Coin title make it a notable curiosity for collectors and historians studying the transition-era games of the early-to-mid 1940s.