Realcent.org

Last night I was watching a Twighlight Zone episode called "The Fever". It was about a man on vacation in Las Vegas who got hooked on a slot machine that ultimately took his life savings and his life. In one scene the slot machine paid out a handful of coins. The eagle from the reverse of a peace silver dollar was clearly visible. That got me wondering how long ago they stopped using real silver dollars in slot machines. I have used the dollar tokens from the casinos before. I have come across of Ike dollars that have the signs of wear from a slot machine. But I have never encountered a real dollar coin, let alone a silver one, being used.

Great question. I remember when I started going to Vegas they were using them all the time Nd then all of a sudden they went to half dollars and no it's all paper ....boo

I believe it was some time in the late 70s, probably around the time the Ike dollar stopped production and when silver spiked to $50/oz. People began cleaning out dollar slots just for the silver. Casinos had to find an alternative, and once they realized they could create their own tokens and sell them for $1 each, there was no turning back. I think I read once that their seigniorage is pretty good, not as good as the govt's of course.

An interesting fact that surprises some tourists is that you can't pay for things (in hotel restaurants, gift shops, etc.) with casino tokens and chips. It ain't money outside the casino.

I remember seeing that one. I was drooling half the time. I can't imagine that story would work today if the machine simply spat out a paper receipt...

The fact that most gambling joints have removed even clad coinage from their internal banks is disappointing. What fun is winning a bunch of money on slots when instead of hearing the constant clanging of coins falling out of a chute, you just get a tiny receipt like an ATM? I used to love walking around the casino floor with a big plastic cup of clad Ikes to drop into random slot machines. One of may reasons I haven't been to Vegas in about a decade... Maybe I'm just turning into a grumpy old man...

Zincanator wrote:The fact that most gambling joints have removed even clad coinage from their internal banks is disappointing. What fun is winning a bunch of money on slots when instead of hearing the constant clanging of coins falling out of a chute, you just get a tiny receipt like an ATM? I used to love walking around the casino floor with a big plastic cup of clad Ikes to drop into random slot machines. One of may reasons I haven't been to Vegas in about a decade... Maybe I'm just turning into a grumpy old man...

Some places still have a certain amount of coin-op. And the slot makers thought of us folks who like the "clink, clink, clink". When you print your receipt out now, a brief precorded clinking sound plays. But it's not the same.

my bet is 1965

Ray remembers when they started.

Rodebaugh wrote:Ray remembers when they started.

They only had penny slots full of Indians back then.

Rodebaugh wrote:Ray remembers when they started.

Fred Underwood

beauanderos wrote:

Rodebaugh wrote:Ray remembers when they started.

Fred Underwood

Nickel slots took wooden ones!

I have sold Wooden Nickels for 10 cents

Half dollars still had silver up through 1970. Maybe 1971 was the year that the silver dollars started to vanish. That's when the clad IKE's first appeared. But I'm just guessing. I wasn't old enough to go to a casino around that time period.

I don't have any special knowledge but I have a hard time believing they would have survived to any significant extent past 1969 in the face of both collector demand and "the great melt" demand - for which the silver dollars would have been the desirable to pull at face value, given higher silver content per buck than the fractional. The big melt started in May 67 when silver spiked to $2/oz and melting silver coin was made illegal and lasted until May 1969 when the price had dropped back (some), the cuni coin had taken over, and the ban was lifted. I was aware of the change in 64 as a kid, and aware of the transition to cuni and the decline of coin in circulation, but silver coin was still available in change and not shockingly unusual through the 70s, even though on the wane and no longer normative. I pulled out the older coin (mercs, etc) and kept them even as a kid.

To add to this, breakeven at face was roughly $1.40/oz for fractional, and by 1971 the price of silver was (briefly) below that. It took a lot of paranoia for people of the time to save their change when face was equal to melt. For silver dollars the breakeven point was a slightly higher spot price but the trend remained the same.

well I do remember playing blackjack and using stacks of silver dollars in Las Vegas. If that happened when I was 18, we're talking 1969... 1972 if I was 21. I don't remember.
I'm thinkin it was 1969.

And now no coins for slots for the most part. Those paper slips. Somehow, that takes away from the fun of it. All buttons and paper and computers.

I have an older uncle who used to go to Vegas frequently during the 60's and 70's, so I asked him about this. He said he remembers it was around the same time silver coins were removed from circulation in 1964. He mentioned that still has silver dollars from jackpots he hit back then. 30% of them are Morgan's and 70% are Peace dollars.