Can an antique Skee-Ball token help unravel the game’s history? A token picked up on the West Coast of the United States in 1915 by a Skee-Ball roller finds its way to a token seller in Fort Wayne, Indiana and then wends its way back to the West Coast 100 years later. Now, that token is helping to unravel another chapter in the fascinating history of the game of Skee-Ball.
Archduke Ferdinand 
Babe Ruth
It was 1914. Against the backdrop of the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand, baseball legend Babe Ruth entering the major leagues, and the inventor of Skee-Ball, Joseph Fourestier Simpson selling the rights to the game to J. D. Este, more mundane corporate machinations were plodding along behind the scenes in Philadelphia.
On June 5, a cryptic article appeared in Variety Magazine, noting that three unnamed Philadelphia Stock Brokers would be operating 100 Skee-Ball alleys at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition.
And on July 16, 1914 the Pacific Coast Skee Ball Company was incorporated in Delaware, whose purpose was:
To acquire by purchase or otherwise and to manufacture and lease or otherwise turn to account skee-ball machines and all other amusement devices.
To purchase, lease or otherwise acquire and to hold, own, use, develop, mortgage, lease or sell or otherwise dispose of all real or personal property necessary or convenient for use as a public amusement park or resort. To purchase lease or otherwise acquire, and to manage both as [illegible]als and agents, theatres, roof gardens, amusement parks and any business [illegible] herewith.
To carry on the business of restaurant owners and vendors of confectionary and tobacco, mineral waters and provisions or of refreshment contractors generally.
Stated more succinctly in its published legal notice:
“To manufacture, sell and deal in and with skee ball machines.”
Frederick W. Cavanagh, the president of the new corporation, assembled an impressive team of brokers, attorneys, and real estate people. His colleagues in the Philadelphia financial elite, James Carstairs, and Christian Hagen, would join him as officers.
In October of 1914, Cavanagh sold his seat on the Philadelphia Stock Exchange for $3100. It is likely that the proceeds of the sale were to be used to fund the fledgling corporation. Cavanagh relocated from Philadelphia to Los Angeles, California, where he would run the company.
While all of these mundane corporate machinations were going on in Philadelphia, more exciting events were happening in California.
A Tale Of Two Expositions
In 1881, the French began an ambitious project in Central America which they would abandon due to engineering problems and high worker mortality. In 1904, the US took over construction. The Panama Canal opened for business in August 15, 1914, a feat of modern engineering that would revolutionize shipping between Europe and the west coast of the United States.
San Francisco and San Diego competed for the honor of hosting the year long International Exposition that would celebrate this boon to international trade. And although San Francisco won the distinction of hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, San Diego decided to go ahead with an Exposition of its own: the Panama-California Exposition.
July 11, 1911, San Diego broke ground for the Panama-California Exposition. Designers, architects and laborers would work for the next several years to get the exposition ready for the public.
Three months later, ground breaking got underway for the Panama-Pacific International Exposition. President William Taft traveled to San Francisco for the event and dug the first shovels worth. It would take over three years to design, build and install, and it would be spectacular.
The Expositions each occupied about 640 acres, but attendance in San Francisco would be five times the San Diego crowd, a total of 18 million people that year.
San Diego’s exposition opened on New Year’s Day in 1915. At midnight Pacific time, President Woodrow Wilson pushed a telegraph button in Washington, DC to open the expo by turning on the power and lights at the park. The exposition featured a dizzying array of exhibits and boasted an amusements area dubbed “The Isthmus” featuring live music, silent movies, a shooting gallery—and the brand new arcade game, Skee-Ball.
On February 20, 1915 the Panama-Pacific International Exposition opened to the public in San Francisco’s Marina District, with fascinating exhibits from around the world. There were sculptures and paintings in the Palace of Fine Arts, auto races, airplane demonstrations, the Tower of Jewels, and The Liberty Bell, that made the trip all the way from Philadelphia to be on display.
The Panama-Pacific International Exposition had its own amusement area called “The Zone” that included roller coasters and the Aeroscope, a steel arm that lifted passengers 265 feet in the air to view the countryside across five counties around the Bay. There was a huge scale model of the Panama Canal with phonographic narration explaining the history and operation of this engineering marvel. And there were Skee-Ball alleys, a definite hit with the crowds.
Having these two expositions running simultaneously on the West Coast was an entrepreneur’s dream. Imagine being able to operate Skee-Ball concessions at not one, but two large expositions for a year, with a built-in audience in the millions—all coming to you. That was Cavanagh’s plan and the reason for the Pacific Coast Skee-Ball Company. From his central location in Los Angeles, Cavanagh would be able to easily travel between the two Expositions as needed over the course of the year. And maybe it would launch an even bigger opportunity. The day after the Panama-Pacific International Exposition opened in San Francisco, an advertisement appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle that hinted that Cavanagh might have loftier plans:
IF you are a hustler with some capital and good references, look over the skee ball alleys at 1256 Fillmore or 1067 Market st. any evening; skee ball is patented and you can get exclusive territory; Fillmore st. place can be leased. PACIFIC COAST SKEE BALL CO.
On January 27, 1916, the officers began to dissolve the company. The Panama-Pacific International Exposition ended on December 4, 1915, and while the San Diego exposition elected to continue for a second year, that decision wasn’t official until March, and the corporate dissolution was already underway.
While cataclysmic events that year, like the Battle of Verdun, were noticed by the entire world, the closure of Cavanagh’s company went silent and unnoticed. Why did Cavanagh and the other officers decide that it was the time to close the company? It appears that the entire point of the company was to operate the alleys for the duration of the Expositions, make as much money as they could, and then dissolve the operation.
This entire piece of Skee-Ball history, and the game’s presence at these historic events, might have been lost to antiquity. But the Pacific Coast Skee-Ball Company minted Skee-Ball tokens as part of their business operation. Although the corporation disappeared and was forgotten, the tokens survived. And those tiny metal discs opened the door to yet another chapter of the Skee-Ball story.
Disappearing into obscurity is nothing new for Skee-Ball, not even in the time period of the Pacific Coast Skee-Ball Company. Joseph Fourestier Simpson, the inventor of the game was eclipsed by J. D. Este by 1915, and would not be discovered again until his records resurfaced in 2011, more than eighty years after his death.
Epilogue
There is one more question that you might want to ask: What happened to all the Skee-Ball alleys that were operated at the expositions? And there were more alleys at 1067 Market St. and 1256 Fillmore near the Exposition in San Francisco. As is so often the case with the history of Skee-Ball, as one puzzle is unraveled, another arises to take its place.
And the balls roll on…
Acknowledgements
Preparation of this article required a group of historians, researchers and organizations to bring it to fruition including:
Laura Ackley
Jonathan Bechtol
John Hepp
Tom Keels
Jim Mundy
Library of Congress
Panama-California Exposition Archive
Panama-Pacific International Exposition Archive
The Union League
Keeley Tulio
We are so happy to have had their help, thank you all!
About The Author
Thaddeus Cooper is the co-author of Seeking Redemption: The Real Story of the Beautiful Game of Skee-Ball, a deep dive into the history of the game. You can find more information about Thaddeus, and his co-author, and their book, at: http://www.nomoreboxes.com/.
