Hullabaloo

The Hullabaloo, manufactured by Field Manufacturing Corporation of Peoria, Illinois in 1932, is a rare and significant example of early pinball history — though it wasn't sold as a standalone cabinet. It was advertised as a replacement playfield kit, letting operators convert several existing games (including titles like Baffle Ball, Bingo, Golden Comet, and others) into the Hullabaloo game. As a pure mechanical design, it predates the electromechanical machines that would dominate the industry for decades to come.

Gameplay on the Hullabaloo relied entirely on mechanical means — gravity, the tilt of the playfield, and strategically placed pins and holes guided the ball's path, since the flipper had not yet been invented. As a conversion playfield rather than a full cabinet, its production and distribution likely mirrored the games it was designed to replace.

Little documentation survives about the Hullabaloo's specific artwork or theme. Its identity as a conversion kit rather than a standalone machine, combined with its scarcity today, makes it a curious footnote for collectors and historians studying how operators refreshed older equipment during the early 1930s.