Cannon Fire (Standard)

The Cannon Fire (Standard), manufactured by the Mills Novelty Company of Chicago in February 1935 as model 1021, is a striking electro-mechanical game from pinball's earliest powered era. It is a licensed version of the Shyvers Coin Automatic Machine Company's 1934 'Cannon Fire,' designed by Kenneth C. Shyvers, and the first Mills versions looked much like the Shyvers original — right down to the same cast aluminum nameplates — before Mills upgraded the nameplate and cabinet.

The game's most distinctive feature is its use of 10 large translucent red glass balls, paired with cannons and hardware finished in polished aluminum. There are four cannons in all: two 'everlastingly alive' cannons averaging two shots each, and two suspended shot cannons that hold a ball at their mouth, awaiting touch-off by a ball passing through the tunnel above. The scoring was progressive — running forward, backward, and zigzag — with no out-holes, rewards for both high and low scores, and free play.

Mills' sales brochure touted the cabinet as a 'masterpiece of art' designed by Eckland, a noted industrial designer, with sturdy construction and ivory-like resilient pins. The Standard model measured 40 inches long by 19 inches wide, and sat within a small family of related Mills games including 'Cannon Fire Jr.,' 'Cannon Fire (Big),' and the countertop 'Impact' of 1935. For enthusiasts of pre-flipper pinball, it is a handsome and mechanically inventive artifact of the mid-1930s.