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In Memory of Dan Fontes with Michael Schiess

Marco Pinball·video·44m 13s·analyzed·May 21, 2026
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.027

TL;DR

Memorial tribute to Dan Fontes, pinball muralist and Oakland street artist.

Summary

Michael Schiess hosts a memorial tribute to Dan Fontes, a legendary muralist and pinball artist who created large-scale pinball-themed murals and famous giraffe street art in Oakland. The event features photographs of Dan's work, personal anecdotes from community members about his kindness and generosity, and discussion of his major artistic projects including backglass reproductions, street art under Bay Area freeways, and museum exhibitions on pinball art and themes.

Key Claims

  • Dan Fontes created the first pinball backglass murals by enlarging original artwork and painting them on large-format canvas, beginning with 'Majorettes' at the first show

    high confidence · Michael Schiess describing Dan's pioneering mural work and how nobody had done this before

  • Dan and Ed (full name not specified) each created approximately 10 large-format murals of Roy Parker and George Melenton backglass artwork respectively

    high confidence · Michael Schiess explaining the division of labor in the mural program

  • Dan created famous giraffe murals on the 580 freeway corridor supports in Oakland that were repainted after the 1989 earthquake when the supports were encased in steel

    high confidence · Multiple references to the giraffes and the 1989 earthquake repainting story

  • Michael Schiess obtained a grant to pay four artists to produce approximately 30 pinball backglass murals through Dan's mural program

    high confidence · Schiess statement: 'I actually got a grant to pay four artists to produce these murals. And it was very successful. I think we got approximately 30 murals out of it.'

  • Dan created a 'Playland Not at the Beach' mural in El Cerrito with Ed Castle over an 18-month period that was later sold to a woman in Nevada after the museum closed

    medium confidence · Schiess describing the mural's creation and relocation, with some uncertainty about the buyer's location

  • Dan found the 'Skyrocket' pinball machine in a barber shop in Oakland and donated it to the museum; its backglass depicts the 1939 World's Fair on Treasure Island viewed from the Bay Bridge

    high confidence · Schiess describing the machine's discovery and significance to the museum collection

  • A 'Golden Gate' mural created by Dan will be displayed at the San Francisco Historical Society Museum in the original mint building on Emperor Norton Way near Chinatown, along with four San Francisco-themed pinball machines

    high confidence · Schiess stating future exhibition plans, noting 'They haven't announced it yet'

Notable Quotes

  • “nobody had ever done this. Taking a back glass, blowing it up”

    Michael Schiess@ 4:06 — Describes Dan's innovation in creating large-format pinball art murals, a novel concept at the time

  • “And Dan goes, oh, well, look, before you go, here, take this... this pinball machine. He says, you should take it... because nobody had ever given me a pinball machine before. So I was blown away.”

    Michael Schiess@ 7:29 — Illustrates Dan's generosity and kindness; he gave Schiess a Doodle Bug machine after Schiess repaired his Sidewalk Engineer

  • “That's kind of what amazes me about pinball. Pinball captures stuff that a lot of the news and media ignore, like that World's Fair. You never even hear about it.”

    Michael Schiess@ 18:19 — Reflects on how pinball backglasses document historical events and cultural moments missed by mainstream media

  • “my art's been tuned. Wow, I did not know that.”

    Michael Schiess@ 25:40 — Dan's observation that his freeway murals survived encasement in steel after the 1989 earthquake

  • “The thing that struck me about him the most when I first met him was his kindness and his friendliness.”

    Community member (name not provided)@ 33:34 — Reflects common sentiment about Dan's character from those who knew him

  • “I have helped scrub the graffiti layer off the zebras. It is a pain in the butt. honestly feels like for every one minute somebody spent spray painting that, you have to spend an hour cleaning it up”

    Community member (name not provided) — Describes the labor-intensive nature of maintaining street art against graffiti

Entities

Dan FontespersonMichael SchiesspersonEd CastlepersonRoy ParkerpersonGeorge MelentonpersonRichard CongerpersonMelissa SchiesspersonKevin TealpersonDavid VelanskypersonDan J ZielinskipersonRichard Tuck

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Major community gathering to honor Dan Fontes' contributions to pinball art and street muralism; demonstrates strong emotional connection and legacy within pinball/arcade community

    high · Large attendance, multiple personal anecdotes, formal exhibition of his artwork

  • ?

    design_innovation: Dan Fontes pioneered the concept of creating large-format canvas murals based on classic pinball backglass artwork, which became a significant artistic movement within pinball community

    high · Schiess: 'nobody had ever done this. Taking a back glass, blowing it up' and 'This was the first pinball mural that Dan did'

  • ?

    historical_signal: Dan Fontes' mural program documented classic pinball artists Roy Parker and George Melenton through approximately 30 large-format reproductions, creating a lasting record of their work

    high · Schiess obtained grant for four artists to create ~30 murals; approximately 10 each of Parker and Melenton reproductions

  • ?

    venue_signal: San Francisco Historical Society Museum planning to exhibit Dan Fontes' 'Golden Gate' mural alongside four SF-themed pinball machines; represents institutional recognition of pinball art

    medium · Schiess: 'it's currently going to be displayed in San Francisco at the San Francisco Historical Society Museum' (not yet announced to public)

  • ?

    collector_signal: Dan Fontes acquired machines through personal relationships (e.g., finding Skyrocket in barber shop) and donated them to museum, demonstrating active role in preserving pinball history

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.133

0:00
Hi everybody. Yeah, this is pretty sad and it's going to be pretty hard for me to do this alone. So I'm going to depend on everybody here if they want to say something about Dan and share a memory.
0:17
And I'm going to show some pictures of Dan and talk about the pictures. Thank you. A lot of cardboard boxes.
1:27
And he'd invite people to come to his arcade. And I don't know if they actually put a quarter in or what, but he would get inside the box and then do whatever he was supposed to do when he were playing it. And he had these, like video games, but he really seemed to motivate, or he really appreciated the older games. Thank you. A
2:52
Oh gosh, this is where I get it. Oh, here we go. So Dan, of course, was a muralist. I took this picture in our old warehouse, and he was painting this one, I believe, for Larry's Artarian. So he did do some commission work, and this was Larry's favorite game. Thank you. I'm not sure if you're all familiar with his work, but it's just incredible. And Dan, not only started doing this, his first mural was Majorettes, and that was at our first show. And it was mind-blowing. I mean, it sounds weird to say it, but nobody had ever done this. Taking a back glass, blowing it up, and he realized that doing that, Thank you. Dan mainly did Roy Parker and Ed kind of liked George Melentin. So they both took on those two, the first pinball artists, and did approximately 10 murals of each of those artists. Thank you. And, you know, I grew up in Oakland and Alameda, but I'd always see these, the famous giraffe murals.

  • Dan applied an anti-graffiti clear coating to his street art that allowed heavy-duty solvents to remove graffiti without damaging the underlying mural

    high confidence · Schiess explaining Dan's protective coating technique for freeway murals

    • @ 41:35
    person
    Christy Holohanperson
    Berkeley Mackperson
    Wadeperson
    Jerry Brownperson
    Rob Parikaperson
    Majorettesgame
    Sidewalk Engineergame
    Doodle Buggame
    Skyrocketgame
    Golden Gategame
    Skywaygame
    Zipgame
    Jokergame
    Surf Champgame

    high · Skyrocket discovery and donation; integration of machines into themed exhibitions

  • ?

    historical_signal: Dan Fontes' giraffe murals on Oakland I-580 freeway supports survived 1989 earthquake and were repainted when supports were encased in steel; represents intersection of pinball culture and public art preservation

    high · Multiple references to freeway murals, earthquake story, anti-graffiti coating innovation, community maintenance efforts

  • ?

    community_signal: Dan Fontes mentored younger artists and helped facilitate picking expeditions and machine repairs; acted as connector within pinball/arcade restoration community

    high · Anecdotes about helping with picking, repairs, moving equipment; personal relationships formed at museum and events

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Dan Fontes' approach to preserving pinball history involved both artistic reproduction (backglass murals) and curation (themed exhibitions, machine preservation), reflecting philosophy that pinball is culturally significant art

    high · 'Sailing Through Pinball' and 'Pinball as Art, Art as Pinball' exhibitions; careful documentation of machines and themes

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Community regularly maintains Dan's street murals by removing graffiti; labor-intensive (1 hour cleanup per minute of graffiti application); demonstrates ongoing community investment in preservation

    high · Community member: 'I have helped scrub the graffiti layer off the zebras. It is a pain in the butt... for every one minute somebody spent spray painting that, you have to spend an hour cleaning it up'

  • ?

    community_signal: Michael Schiess operates a pinball museum that serves as community gathering space; Dan Fontes regularly worked at front desk, hosted concerts, and facilitated connections between collectors and enthusiasts

    high · References to museum events, concerts at Magic Juju, regular Sunday visits, front desk presence

    • 5:47
    And I didn't know who did them, but I just thought, wow, that is, what a great idea, because they had the ivy would grow during the spring, and the giraffes looked like they were eating the ivy off the underside of the freeway. It was just so cool. You know, what a great idea. I was a side walk engineer that was broken and I was just getting into this. I really didn't know my butt from a hole in the ground of fixing these things, but I was willing to try. I don't even know how he contacted me, but somehow, I think he might have come to the Lucky Juju, and he told me he had this game. So I went to his studio that was in Oakland at that time, and I worked on his Sidewalk Engineer, and I got it to actually do a few things. I didn't fix it completely, but he was impressed, you know, because I actually got the crane to move and go down.
    6:53
    But I couldn't fix it completely, and I was kind of embarrassed. But I was just doing it because I like to work on these things.
    7:01
    And so I was going, well, I wish I could do more for you, Dan, but, you know, that's about as far as I know how to work on these things. And I had already shocked myself three times doing it.
    7:12
    So I said, yeah, I think that's about it. I spent about three or four hours on it. And so Dan goes, oh, well, look, before you go, here, take this. And I said, what? He says, well, this pinball machine.
    7:27
    He says, you should take it. I went, you mean you're giving it to me? Because nobody had ever given me a pinball machine before. So I was blown away. I couldn't believe he was that generous. It was a doodle bug. Thank you. I'm a big fan of the
    8:41
    But it was kind of neat because... Oh, there we go. Okay. Hey, I'm learning how to operate this. So... And then Dan started doing his own exhibits, and this was at one of our expos, and he was talking about... I think he was talking about mural painting, but also about this exhibit. He did a couple of exhibits. One was about, called Sailing Through Pinball, where he collected all this stuff. He went up to Richard Congers and took pictures and borrowed a couple games. It all had to do with, he figured out that the pinball people lived by the lake in Michigan, and so they all had sailboats. You know, it was a matter of status. So there was a lot of games that had these sailboats. On the back glass, and that was the theme of the pinball machine. So he collected and collated all that and put up a beautiful exhibit. We had one large room where we could do it at that point.
    9:57
    And then the other one was Pinball as Art, Art as Pinball, which he worked on with my wife, Melissa. and he collated a lot of pinball art, previous shows, of which there weren't too many, and put that up in the museum. Real successful shows.
    10:21
    And so this is one of the murals that we have, Corral. Dee, I know you want this. It is beautiful. Yeah, and you can't have it.
    10:35
    Sorry. So these things are 10 by 10 feet. And, you know, a lot of the other shows wanted to borrow them. So all I said was, well, yeah, we'd like to send you some of the murals.
    10:49
    You've got to pay for shipping, and we've got to insure them. That's kind of where, you know, they didn't want to do that for some reason. So they haven traveled at all we been trying to find a museum that would actually put on a show of these murals They've been to Germany. They were hung up in the Fano Museum, I'm going to go ahead and get started. This is the baby giraffe. Is this the baby giraffe? I think it is. Yeah, looks like the baby giraffe. So these are in Oakland. If you're not familiar with it, this is what Dan is, everybody knows Dan from these. These are the Anna Murals, I believe is what he called them. They were all over the 580 corridor on the supports underneath the freeway. A
    12:49
    I think he would put, after he finished the mural, he would put this clear coating. And what it did is you could put really heavy-duty solvents, and it wouldn't take off the anti-graffiti coating and the mural that was underneath it, but it would remove any kind of paint. So the graffiti artists were frustrated, I'm sure. And I believe he actually has this one mural that got covered up, oddly enough, I don't think he's uncovered it yet. It's the duck pond mural. He did uncover that. Oh, okay.
    13:34
    It was a funny story where they covered it up at midnight. You know, which, and it was kind of a battle between him and the art czar in Oakland under Jerry Brown.
    13:51
    And so Dan got the final word, I guess, because he knew all along that, okay, you can cover it up, but I know it's still under there. And one of these days I'm going to uncover it. So I'm really glad to hear he did that.
    14:05
    These are some of the, you know, stairs that he did. These are jellyfish that he did with some other artists. I'm not privy to know who all worked on this, but I know he had help with Christy Holohan, and there was another gentleman that worked on this one.
    14:25
    This is the Oakland Steps. I don't know exactly where this is. It's the Harrington Steps. Yeah. Okay, yeah. Yeah, they were just painting this on there.
    14:56
    This is more jellyfish. Like I said, there's two that are my favorites, and this is one of them. A game that Berkley Mack had in his basement.
    15:14
    This is one of the third ones I think he did. And it's huge. It's bigger than all the other ones because he took the roll and he did it sideways. So it's 10 feet tall by 12 to 13 feet wide. And this one is hanging up in the oddball room at the museum. So it's one of my favorites.
    15:38
    And it was kind of out of place because it's George Melenton. It's not Roy Parker. But, yeah, it's great.
    15:48
    This is one of his turtle murals. I think this is on 580. I'm sorry, 80, yeah, 80. And so I see this one a lot driving by.
    16:01
    Turtle likes to smile at people. Oops, did I do that wrong? There's David Velansky with Dan. David couldn't be here today because he just had hip surgery, but he wanted to.
    16:20
    So this is Golden Gate, which Dan Miller commissioned. There it's Dan. And this has seen a lot of exhibitions. We had this at Chabot. It's currently going to be displayed in San Francisco at the San Francisco Historical Society Museum, which is in the original mint, which is on Emperor Norton Way, just shy of Chinatown. So it's going to be pretty cool to see this.
    16:57
    I don't know if I can shrink that down. Thank you. They haven't announced it yet. All the games are in there, the mural's in there.
    17:38
    And this will be a real treat to go see this. We have four San Francisco themed games in there along with this Golden Gate mural. The other game that's really cool is Skyrocket. And Skyrocket was a game that Dan found in a barber shop in Oakland And he immediately brought it to the museum and said, yeah, here.
    18:05
    It just is amazing because what it is, the back glass is you're on the Bay Bridge and you're looking at Treasure Island in 1939 and there's the World's Fair. And it's on this back glass. I mean, that's kind of what amazes me about pinball. Pinball captures stuff that a lot of the news and media ignore, like that World's Fair. You never even hear about it. A lot of people didn't even know there was a World's Fair there.
    18:38
    But that's kind of what pinball does. Remember Skylab? It's on a pinball machine. There's a lot of stuff on pinball machines that you just won't see anywhere else for some reason.
    18:53
    Yeah, let's see. Uh-oh. How do I do that again? Oh. Okay. There we go. So this, sorry it's so small. Oh, there we go. I'm getting better at this. This was something that Dan worked on with Ed Castle and they spent, I'd like to say a year and a half.
    19:34
    Yeah, 18 months working on this mural for Playland Knot at the Beach in El Cerrito. I think this is one of his most proud murals because he had the forethought to, it was supposed to go on a wall at the beach. Thank you. I'm forgetting his name.
    20:30
    Richard, yeah. Richard, what was his name? Richard Tuck, thanks. He passed away and so the museum basically folded up eventually. Dan was able to go in there and pull this off the wall and I believe he sold it to a lady in Nevada, I think? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, so that's fantastic because it lives on. It is just an amazing mural. It's got all this great stuff in it. And this is from where Playland at the Beach was in San Francisco right by the Cliff House on Ocean Beach.
    21:18
    That's seriously inspiring. Yeah. Camera obscura. Yeah, camera obscura. And of course, you know, the murals for the pinball, they weren't under the gun. They were doing this and they were having fun with it, all the artists. But every year, you know, when we were doing our expos, more murals got done and we would put them up. And at one point, we were hanging them back to back so you wouldn't see the white canvas. I going to go to get a surgeon to wire their jaw shut It was truly amazing
    22:11
    So the first show we did in 2007, Dan had done majorettes. And he offered, he wanted to raise money for the museum. A lot of people have been asking about the mural. I'm sure you've heard of it. It's a mural of a man who was a museum curator. He was a museum curator. Thank you. I'm going to go ahead and show you a picture of the giraffe.
    23:53
    There's Ed and Dan at the warehouse, the old warehouse. Dan was pretty fascinated by Joker for some reason. I'm not sure what it was. I think it was because Ed would not only paint as pretty precisely as you could, but Ed was also colorblind. That always blew our minds. I'm not sure when that was, 2016 that maybe he got commissioned to redo some of the giraffe and the animal murals. Thank you. Yeah. One thing about those drafts that Dan would always tell us, and he was pretty proud of it, is that he originally did it on the concrete supports. And after the 89 earthquake, they encased them in steel encasements, and he got to repaint them on the outside. Because I remember him telling me, he goes, my art's been tuned.
    25:40
    Wow, I did not know that. Also, I think that's probably perforated. Thank you. When Roy Parker did it, he made some mistakes. Ed corrected them.
    26:25
    He'd always do that. There's little ropes or something, but they weren't done very well, so Ed fixed it.
    26:35
    I thought that was pretty funny. Here's majorettes. So this was the first pinball mural that Dan did.
    26:43
    I really love this one. The thing that was nice about these is they weren't framed. They were just done, you know, so they're very simple, you know, very, I call it pure, you know, just art on canvas. And here's this mermaid.
    27:04
    This is the mural that he did inside the museum that just sets the tone. Thank you. We are now at the end of the presentation.
    28:13
    And I worked out a deal. I had just finished the prototype for the clear pin that Wade and I had done. And it was just, and so for payment, he said, I want, you know, will you give me that clear pin? I believe he still has it.
    28:32
    The, no. Just, yeah, it's a surf champ. It's a prototype, yeah. So I thought, yeah, that's appropriate.
    28:47
    Oh, here's my second favorite one, which is Skyway. It's a space thing. I just love this one. And that's hanging up in the, I guess I call that the Midway Room. It's got a place all of its own. And if you ever want to come to the museum and just look at the murals, it's free. Just come on in.
    29:16
    Here's Zip. Zip went to Museum Mechanique, I believe. Dan Zielinski was going to buy that one. And I'll help facilitate that if it hasn't gone there yet. Because I know... Yeah. Okay. Yeah, it's pretty amazing. This is one of the back glasses from Richard Conger's collection that Rob Parika shot. And that's the other shot of it. So Kevin Teal, who did a lot of pinball photography, had this job working for Pottery Barn. And so he had access to the studio where they were shooting these oriental rugs. And he realized, wow, that's perfect to shoot all these murals. So we went over there at 10 o'clock when everybody was gone and started shooting these things. Thank you. So yeah, this was the mural program that Dan started. And I actually got a grant to pay four artists to produce these murals. And it was very successful. I think we got approximately 30 murals out of it. So these are all of them.
    31:31
    And they're just fantastic. Ed and Dan really put their heart and soul into it and made something that's a legacy for everybody to enjoy forever.
    31:53
    I'd love it if some people would come up here and share some stories. I actually got introduced to Dan by Michael at one of the I was at the museum or one of the events or something like that. Dan and I started talking and we sort of hit it off. And just after that, no matter how briefly it was, I'd run into him and sometimes we'd sit and talk and sometimes it would just be a, hey, how are you? And I wouldn't see him until the next year.
    32:48
    They had a, I remember they had some concerts. I was at the Magic Juju in San Rafael and I got to go see one of those. I think that a great question
    33:34
    Hi, I didn't know Dan real well, but the thing that struck me about him the most when I first met him was his kindness and his friendliness.
    33:48
    And I met him first here at a show a few years ago with Antoinette. Some of you probably know Antoinette. I'm going to start with the first question.
    34:27
    Thank you. Hi, my name is Gene. I didn't know Dan very well, but I guess I met him at California Extreme. I used to do solo bass in the hallways. I don't know, maybe some of you saw me play. But I talked to him. I knew he was a great muralist. He came to my house and did a great I can show you guys. And yeah, I played at your houseboat one time, if you remember. Did a little solo concert. I think that was the exchange, but yeah, that's all. I can show the picture if you guys want to see. It's not a... You want to show it to the camera? It's not Nancy. You did it in the afternoon. Thank you. I ended up spending most of my Sundays there at the museum. And Dan would be working the front desk and in between like me playing games of pinball, I would be sitting up there at the front desk, you know, just chit chatting with him. Definitely love the giraffes. I live about four blocks from there, so I see them just about every day. Among the other art that I actually have of that he has given me over the years. A.J. Thank you. I'm a big fan of yours. There was one year or so where he did a project where he was doing these pencil drawings of like people that he knew that he really liked, whatever type deal. I was luckily one of those people that he drew. Unfortunately it was my 43rd birthday and I was really drunk at the time. So it definitely is funny because realistically if he actually drew what I was doing was sticking my tongue out at the camera every time he tried to take a picture of me. But eventually he took a picture while I was looking away and it looks lovely. My mother loves it. She's got a copy that she has printed off that's sitting in the hallway of their house. Another I'm a big fan of the And I'm going to go ahead and get started.
    39:19
    I'm really going to miss the guy. He's the type of guy that I could call up for help moving something or he would call me up to help moving something kind of thing. Did that quite often with him. Definitely miss that. It's kind of fun to go off on a picking adventure, if you will, to get something. I'm a big fan of the I'm very much a person who always arranges my time off well in advance. I went to my boss, I said, I never do this to you, I'm sorry. Can I please take Wednesday off? Nothing major is going on. And I get this great opportunity to go see this wonderful pinball collection and it was way better than I thought it was going to be. So, just another, again, picking The A lot of people have been asking me about the I would come out and visit with him or I'd be like, hey, let's go do lunch.
    41:29
    Or, hey, if you want something, let me know. We'll go pick up something for you, stuff like that. I have helped scrub the graffiti layer off the zebras. It is a pain in the butt.
    41:42
    It honestly feels like for every one minute somebody spent spray painting that, you have to spend an hour cleaning it up kind of thing. All right, Dan, so you're here and want to come live on NILA. He asked me, he's like, is it okay if I give up? And I felt really bad about it. And I'm like, yeah, Dan, please give up on it. They're just going to keep tagging it and tagging it and tagging it.
    42:14
    It's better for you. Because honestly, for a lot of that, he was just coming over and doing that. He was doing it out of pocket of himself and doing that and stuff like that, A lot of fun. Thank you. Thank you for, you know, supporting us doing this here because it's a little hard for me to do this, to be honest with you. So I really appreciate the support in doing this. Thank you.
    44:11
    Thank you.