A Circus

"A Circus" is a rare and enigmatic pure mechanical pinball machine from 1932, manufactured by Colonial Specialties Company of Chicago. Little is documented about this obscure title beyond its manufacturing details: it is listed in the Encyclopedia of Pinball as a conversion game, though the game it converted is not specified. It may be that Colonial only produced replacement playfields, in which case this one likely corresponds to Ace Novelty's own 1932 'A Circus'.

As a single-player, purely mechanical machine, "A Circus" predates the flipper (introduced in 1947) and any electromechanical scoring. Players would have relied on gravity, tilt, and skillful plunger shots to route the ball toward scoring holes or targets, in the manner typical of early pin games of the period.

Unfortunately, little is known about the design, art, or theme of "A Circus." Without notable features or visual details on record, this machine's interest lies chiefly in its rarity and its place in the tangled early history of Chicago's pin-game manufacturers, several of whom appear to have produced closely related or duplicate titles during this period.