Dust Whirls

Dust Whirls, manufactured by the Roy McGinnis Company of Baltimore, Maryland in May 1944, is a product of one of the most unusual periods in pinball history. During World War II, wartime material restrictions halted the production of new pinball machines, so companies turned to converting existing games instead. Dust Whirls is exactly such a conversion: it was built on Bally's one-ball 'Club Trophy' and reworked into a new game.

As a one-ball horserace-style game set for free play, Dust Whirls belongs to the gambling-adjacent side of 1940s coin-op, where a single ball's fate determined the outcome rather than the extended multi-ball-per-game play of amusement pinballs. Detailed information about its playfield and artwork has not survived in the historical record, which only adds to its mystique.

For collectors and historians, Dust Whirls is interesting less for its gameplay than for what it represents: the resourcefulness of wartime conversion manufacturers, who kept arcades and taverns supplied with 'new' games at a time when no new machines could be built.