Last weekend I visited the Vintage Flipper World pinball museum just outside Ann Arbor, Michigan. Among the games there was Gottleib’s 1955 table Sweet Add-A-Line. It’s a peculiar table by modern standards, since nearly all the playfield is a bunch of lanes, channels through which the pinball might roll. But …
I apologize for the Coors sign reflected in the back glass. I didn’t even see it when I was taking the picture.
Each of the lanes is numbered. Rolling one down lights up that number in the backglass, as above. And if you roll all the numbers in one of the eight strips of tape, the game opens up bonus opportunities. It’s a fun game and certainly one of the top adding-machine-themed pinball machines I’ve ever played. I grant this is of marginal mathematical content, but, heck, I smiled.
The Internet Pinball Database has a scan of the game’s advertising flyer, which I like if nothing else for its defensive “Amusement Pinballs: as American as Baseball and Hot Dogs!” slogan.
nebusresearch 
A pinball museum? Sounds like heaven. In every arcade I have ever been to, I always find myself drifting towards the pinball machines.
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It is indeed a great place. Unfortunately it’s only rarely open to the public (zoning problems). But there are wonderful and generally-open museums for pinball. The most famous is in Las Vegas — that one’s credited with leading the current happy revival of pinball — although the one I know best is the Silverball Museum in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Well worth getting to if you’re in the Garden State.
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Thanks so much! I am definitely adding this to my list of places to go.
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It’s certainly worth it. Well, the ones I’ve been to are. There are a couple arcades with a healthy number of pinball machines too. I’m happy to say Michigan is one of the centers of the current pinball renaissance.
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There’s nothing like a pinball machine,one wrong move and it titles,it doesn’t get any better then that
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No, there isn’t anything like that. The appeal of real things that move is a powerful one. Well, and making the right move where you slide the machine, save the ball, and get away with it. That’s really powerful.
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I own one of these and love it. I got a Google alert on your post because I’m always on the lookout for a better specimen of SAAL. What makes it such a great game is the massive adrenaline rush of the “replay” that existed at the height of these games in the ’50’s combined with the unique fact that in SAAL if you roll over all the lanes, you score 26 replays – you max out the replay reel. That’s was a rush beyond compare “back in the day.”
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I’m glad to hear from someone who owns one! I wasn’t able to get more than one column of numbers completed in the limited time I had to play. (The museum is unfortunately open to the public only a few times a year, but it’s got a great selection of 1950s machines to play.) Just the thought of maxing out the replay reel is awesome, though. If I ever do it … well, wow.
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