Baby Whiffle

The Baby Whiffle, manufactured by Automatic Industries of Youngstown, Ohio in January 1932, is an early example of a pure mechanical (non-electric) tabletop/counter game from the dawn of the pinball industry. According to the Encyclopedia of Pinball, a similar Baby Whiffle was also made in November 1931 by Automatic Industries, Ltd. in Canada, suggesting the game may have originated slightly earlier north of the border.

As a purely mechanical, single-player counter game, the Baby Whiffle predates the electro-mechanical innovations that would soon come to define the pinball industry -- and it predates the invention of the flipper by roughly fifteen years, so gameplay relied entirely on gravity, angled pins, and skillful plunging rather than any player-controlled paddles.

Little detailed information survives about the machine's specific design, artwork, or designer. Its age alone makes it a notable artifact from the earliest days of American pinball manufacturing, offering a glimpse into the simple mechanical amusement games that preceded the coin-operated pinball machines of the mid-20th century.