Fifty Grand

The Fifty Grand, manufactured by Automatic Games Company of Inglewood, California in 1933, is an early electro-mechanical pinball machine from the very first years of the industry. Its most historically notable feature is its backbox: a wooden head with a cast aluminum front and lighted scoring. This makes Fifty Grand an early example of a game with a backbox - a feature that appeared on only some games during 1935-36 and did not become a regular fixture until 1937, several years after this machine.

The gameplay proposition was straightforward and affordable: players received 10 balls for five cents. The lighted scoring in the backbox gave the game a touch of electric spectacle at a time when most competitors were still purely mechanical countertop affairs.

Little additional information survives about the game's designer or its production. Nevertheless, as an early electro-mechanical machine with a pioneering backbox, the Fifty Grand remains a meaningful artifact for understanding how pinball's now-familiar form took shape.