North Star Montreal Pintastic 2018!

Pintastic New England·video·49m 40s·analyzed·Jul 14, 2018

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.031

TL;DR

Adam Keisler chronicles Montreal's legalization of pinball in bars and North Star's role as curator of pinball history.

Summary

Adam Keisler presents the history of North Star, a pinball bar in Montreal, detailing his personal journey into competitive pinball, the decades-long legal battle to legalize pinball in bars (banned since the 1970s due to moral panic), and the eventual 2017 bylaw change that permitted it. He also covers the restoration of two original 1949-1951 North Star pinball machines made by the Tremblay brothers, the only significant pinball machines ever manufactured in Canada, and discusses North Star's evolution as both a bar and cultural institution showcasing pinball history.

Key Claims

Pinball was banned in Montreal from the 1970s until 2017 due to a bylaw restricting machines within 20 meters of alcohol-serving establishments
high confidence · Adam Keisler, direct reference to bylaw 556 and legalization in March 2017
The Tremblay brothers founded the original North Star Coin Machine Company in the late 1940s and produced approximately 2,000 pinball machines between 1949-1951, the only two machines of significance ever manufactured in Canada
high confidence · Adam Keisler, with specific reference to two models: Sea Breeze and Rishel You
Pinball was ruled illegal by the Supreme Court of Canada in 1955 and overturned in January 1976
high confidence · Adam Keisler, citing Canada's Pinball Podcast as reference
Montreal police destroyed approximately $500,000 worth of pinball machines (equivalent to over $3 million today) in the early 1970s due to concerns about youth delinquency
high confidence · Adam Keisler, citing Montreal Gazette articles from 1971
The original North Star factory sign from Gottlieb's Chicago facility is displayed as a backdrop at North Star bar after being purchased at auction by a friend
high confidence · Adam Keisler, describing the artifact on display
North Star bar installed one of the first Stern machines on location in Canada in summer 2017
high confidence · Adam Keisler
The Tremblay brothers' first Canadian pinball machine featured a Maple Leaf design and retailed for $295, built on sand urbaine street in Montreal
high confidence · Adam Keisler
A Western bar in downtown Montreal where North Star had installed pinball machines suffered a five-alarm fire two weeks after machine installation, with the roof collapsing everywhere except over the pinball machines
high confidence · Adam Keisler, describing insurance and risk management lessons

Notable Quotes

“children are so fascinated by these machines that some of them even steal money from their mothers purse to be able to play them”
Montreal Gazette article from 1953 (cited by Adam Keisler)@ 9:12 — Historical framing of moral panic about pinball affecting youth
“the purpose of the bylaw is not to prohibit gaming on grounds of public morals and to fill in what able perceived as gaps in the Criminal Code”
Judge ruling on 1985 Supreme Court petition (cited by Adam Keisler)@ 10:05 — Legal justification for the Montreal pinball bylaw as zoning/commerce regulation rather than moral prohibition
“the people themselves are very much behind the bylaw the way pend mall operators reacted to the bylaw proves there is a need to restrict access”
Mayor Jean Drapeau, 1977 (cited by Adam Keisler)@ 11:08 — Historical rhetorical strategy to frame operator resistance as proof of public support for restriction
“I decided that I was gonna fight for the right to drink beer and play pinball”
Adam Keisler@ 13:50 — Personal motivational statement driving legalization campaign
“if you want something and you want to make it happen the way to go about it is continuing to try until it's a success”
Adam Keisler@ 42:04 — Advice on persistence in dealing with bureaucracy, directly related to legalization effort
“gangsters to hipsters pinball populace can always count on the media to do a great job”
Adam Keisler (tagline for legalization celebration) — Humorous reflection on media framing of pinball's cultural rehabilitation

Entities

Adam KeislerpersonNorth Star Coin Machine CompanycompanyNorth StarorganizationGerard TremblaypersonJacques TremblaypersonSteve DanielspersonRoger SharpepersonRobert Rockyperson

Signals

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historical_signal: Detailed chronology of Montreal's pinball ban from 1970s through 2017 legalization, tracing roots to moral panic about youth delinquency and organized crime in arcades
high · Multiple Montreal Gazette articles cited (1953, 1971, 1977, 1985); Supreme Court rulings (1955 ban, 1976 overturn, 1985 bylaw challenge); bylaw 556 adoption in 1977 under Mayor Drapeau
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venue_signal: North Star opened January 2016 as Montreal's first legal pinball bar following 2017 bylaw amendment; now operates with 11 pinball machines plus historical attractions
high · Adam Keisler description of opening date, machine count, and bylaw amendment timeline; media coverage from CBC and CTV News in 2016
?
restoration_signal: Full restoration of two original 1949-1951 North Star machines (Sea Breeze and Rishel You) by Keisler's team, including playfield replacement, new back glass, cabinet restoration, and collaboration with surviving Tremblay brother Jacques
high · Adam Keisler detailed description of restoration work; Jacques Tremblay's provision of original parts and blessing of the modern venture
?
community_signal: Adam Keisler founded Montreal Punk Pinball League post-2013 to establish competitive scene in previously barren market; now operating pinball installations across Montreal including outdoor shipping container activation
high · Keisler's description of league founding, outdoor festival activations, and goal to 'bring pinball to the people'
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operational_signal: Five-alarm fire destroyed downtown Montreal location two weeks after machine installation; machines miraculously spared as roof collapsed everywhere except over pinball area; incident highlights insurance importance

Topics

Montreal pinball legalization historyprimaryNorth Star bar operations and cultural missionprimaryHistorical moral panic about pinball (1950s-1980s)primaryRestoration of original Canadian-made North Star pinball machinesprimaryCompetitive pinball tournaments and community buildingsecondaryPinball machine operations and insurance risk managementsecondaryPinball as cultural artifact and museum piecesecondaryGovernment regulation and bureaucratic change advocacysecondary

Sentiment

positive(0.82)— Adam Keisler's presentation is celebratory and inspirational, focusing on success against adversity. He frames the legalization victory positively, emphasizes cultural preservation, and reflects fondly on the North Star project. The tone is passionate about pinball's value and Montreal's pinball community. The single negative note is the fire disaster, which he frames as a learning experience rather than dwelling on loss.

Transcript

youtube_auto_sub · $0.000

and how many Canadians do we have in the room today I see what they see a lot of North North Star t-shirts and I have a North Star t-shirt too so we're all good the forces of good versus down from Montreal thanks to everybody for coming today I know there's lots going on at the show so I appreciate you taking some time out to hear what I have to say thanks to David and Gabe and the entire fantastic team the show is amazing I was here for the first year and I haven't been able to make it back since but I'm happy to be here this year I'll be doing a question and answer at the end of the presentation I have some shirts and prizes to give away so if you have some questions please feel free to save them till the end and then you can claim your prizes and I can answer your questions all right so we're gonna get started so just a short history of my own personal connection to pinball I first started owning machines and around 2011 2012 I became addicted to pinball you know you know you buy the first machine and then they can quickly multiply I think everybody here knows how that goes I had a friend who's actually in this room right now mr. Steve Daniels at this time who I met through pinball and he told me about these things called pinball tournaments which I didn't know existed or were a thing and he said you know there's this huge tournament in Pittsburgh called pin burg I think you should come you would have a good time and I said I don't know if pinball tournaments are for me I just like to have a beer and you know play with my friends and goof around I'm not really serious about that kind of stuff and he said no that would come along so I went to friend Burt for the first time in 2013 and I was hooked on competitive pinball after that so I came back to Montreal and I tried to set up some leagues and get some stuff going on but there was absolutely no pinball in Montreal it was basically a wasteland I created the Montreal Punk pinball league which you can see the logo here after pin burg in 2013 and my goal was to grow competitive pinball in Montreal organize events and try to get a scene going where I live so at the same time a local pinball historian Robert rocky who runs Montreal pinball comm and is a partner at North Star as well reconnected me with an old mutual friend and I had known from decades ago in the Montreal music scene so it turns out this old friend Justin was also obsessed with pinball and he turned part of his home into a pinball speakeasy or he would host private events for friends so this became the original North Star and proof of concept the parties quickly became legendary and after my first visit I brought up the idea of bringing the bar above ground and sharing our pinball collections with the city I created a business plan found a location and started to work due diligence to hope in the real North Star it was in an early meeting with the city when I found a location and I was all ready to go and I told them what I was gonna do and they say well wait a second you want to have a pinball arcade that's in a bar you can't do that and I said what do you mean I can't do that that doesn't make any sense and they told me that there's this old law on the books and you you just can't do this in Montreal so the clip you're about to see here was filmed at the original North Star location a group of Montreal wants to introduce bar Cannes to the city they want to open a bar in the plateau and fill it with vintage pinball machines but they say they're swimming through a sea of red tape Morgan Greg Dunlap met with one of them earlier today Adam Keisler is passionate about pinball and elements of chance although it remains a game of skill the thing that I love about it is that the ball is wild so you're trying to control chaos he and his friends collect pinball machines they even fixed one up made right here in Montreal back in 1949 the one surviving brother actually came and autographed the machine that our crew had restored in 2013 and has given us his blessing to carry on the name of his company now they want to use the name Northstar for a noob arcade filled with pinball machines other bar caves have been opened in recent years including McFly in Quebec City and dozens in cities across the u.s. but Keisler says here a bylaw is standing in his way I've been trying to meet with the mayor and that's not possible I was then sent to council person Alex Norris for the plateau borough and I've been having a lot of trouble getting him to listen to what I have to say we managed to reach the plateau Kristen Gosselin says the bylaw dates back to the 1970s when arcades could be dangerous places for means where youngsters were recruited for the purposes of juvenile prostitution so the law dates from that epoch and obviously it's no longer current she says the plateau is considering amending the bylaw but it could take a while we're looking at a delay of a year and a half or two to make this type of amendment she says there may be quicker routes and Kaiser says he will do whatever it takes so Montreal errs can get it on the fun morgen Greg Dunlap CBC News Montreal so that was the that was the beginning of the story now if we rewind 30 years to 1985 this is an article from the Montreal Gazette and it has this great quote from an amusement firm official who laments that juvenile prostitution drug dealing and loan sharking happen everywhere in Montreal but the blame is always put on the arcades these ideas can be traced back another 30 years here is an article from the Montreal Gazette published in 1953 it states well the old pool room was once the bane of the worried mother but something else seems to be taking its place it is some of the places that may operate as restaurants tobacco shops or shoeshine parlors but which have a low moral health rating such businesses are often built more or less around pinball games described as the first cousins of the slot machines pinball machines were seen as corrupting the youth the article continues quote still further youngsters can be so seized by the attraction of the games that they may even be found stealing money to go on play as we know pinball was ruled illegal by the Supreme Court in Canada this was in 1955 until it was overturned in January of 1976 and February 5th 1971 Montreal police warned pinball manufacturers to keep their machines out of Montreal the article states that Montreal police have destroyed almost $500,000 which today would be the equivalent of over three million dollars worth of the quote nickel suckers again on concern over the health and safety of children is cited missed article states quote children are so fascinated by these machines that some of them even steal money and their mothers purse to be able to play them others steal coins from the neighbors milk bottles who many squander their lunch money in them and come home hungry at the end of the day in September of 1977 with pinball now illegal in Canada the responsibility for policing pinball machines in Montreal shifted from the police to the city with the adoption of bylaw 556 zoning bylaw that heavily restricted pinball machines in a 1985 petition to the Supreme Court of Canada to overturn the bylaw on the grounds of it being illegal arguing that pinball is now legal legal in Canada so it should be in Montreal as well the judge ruled that quote the purpose of the bylaw is not to prohibit gaming on grounds of public morals and to fill in what we are perceived as gaps in the Criminal Code of the buyer law in general deals with Commerce and zoning and was also adopted for policing purposes to protect youth and prevent delinquency so this bylaw came into effect under Mayor Jean Trevor you can see here he was the mayor of Montreal from 1954 to 57 and again from 1960 to 86 Jeff Bowman was a criminal lawyer before serving as mayor and during his reign as mayor he aimed to clean up Montreal as it was once considered Sin City it was also interesting to point out the timing of the bylaw around the 1976 Montreal Olympics when the eyes of the world would be on the city in this article from August of 1977 troppo tries to gain public support of the bylaw by arguing that it is in fact the public who supports this new law with the only opposition being operators with pinball machines he stays quote the people themselves are very much behind the bylaw the way pend mall operators reacted to the bylaw proves there is a need to restrict access to the games in other words the fact that pinball operators were upset above the law proves to the public that pinball operators are profiting off the youth and ball machines were not the only thing that drove fought against before he was mayor he had the city banned food trucks in 1947 deeming them unsanitary and undignified and this law preventing food trucks in Montreal has only been overturned within the last few years funnily enough something else he did was create the first lottery system in Canada so the pinball's couldn't be there but we could have a locking system this one's really interesting so this was around the same time David McKiernan an addiction research specialist at McGill University in Montreal claimed that pinball players become hypnotized by the game's flashing lights and repetitive noises he said the players may fall into a trance-like states and withdraw from reality well he likened this experience to that of compulsive gamblers and heroin addicts while all these notions may seem ridiculous just today they played a key role in the public course surrounding the legality and dangers of pinball at the time and are a big part of the reason why pinball remained illegal in Montreal until last year so now I'm just gonna talk a little about my experience with the bylaw since it was ruled legal federally a Canada the provinces still have control of what could happen just like here you have you know federal laws and then state laws and so under the guise of protectionism the city of Montreal passed a bylaw that forbid pinball machines from being operated within 20 meters of an establishment that serves alcohol and this is what I was told when I went to the city to try to open the bar they said well you can't have pinball machines in a bar you can't even have pinball machines within 20 meters of a bomb so yeah so I found this like pretty ridiculous because if you replace pinball with pool or video lottery games that the government runs anything else like that's okay but pinball is a problem my whole goal with the North Star was to bring in ball back to the streets and bring it out of the collectors basements and have it available for everyone to play I wanted to share my machines with the public and start a pinball community in the city I decided that I was gonna fight for the right to drink beer and play pinball the public while I was unable to get a meeting with the mayor or city councilor I went to the medium and that was the first clip that you saw funnily enough the same day I was interviewed by the media prior to it being aired I received a call from Christine Gosselin who you saw in the clip who was the city councilor and she had just been interviewed by CBC for the story the reporter on the story sent her a copy of the proposal that we prepare to amend the bylaw and she was calling to organize a meeting to discuss the possibilities that began to started pathetic relationship and this city counselor became an ally in helping our dream become a reality while the wheels of bureaucracy turned slowly as she said in the video could take one and a half to two years to pass the bylaw we were given the unofficial quote-on-quote go-ahead to operate during the time it took for the law to be changed now this was a bit risky because the way the city operates is it's on a complaint basis so if somebody had made a complaint that we were you know openly going against the bylaw the city would be forced to investigate and they could have shut us down at any time before the bylaw has changed but we decided to take that chance because we're a little crazy and we secured our location and began to build in our star this is a clip from January of 2016 shortly after the bar had become a reality Montreal now has its first pinball bar and if you don't think that's a big deal consider this pinball has been banned in bars for decades and technically still is Rob Lurie explains the sounds the look are low lobe trotters yep hidden ball is back in motion it was over a hundred years ago I think it's back to the future at the North Star bar on sailor all and it's a throwback to a time way before Playstations and even before pac-man there's a sensory type of interaction with it which you don't get from having a tablet experience of this while it all seems like good clean fun this is a game many politicians have declared war on pinball was banned from the early 40s to the mid 70s in cities including New York LA and Montreal mayor jean drop OHS administration would cease pinball machines believing teenagers would be tempted to steal money to play an organized crime using arcades to kind of draw people into prostitution or drugs or whatever and this was like kind of peaked in the late 70s early 80s and they shut down all the all the all the machines everywhere that's right only certain arcades in Montreal can have pinball bars aren't supposed to it's kind of time for this to reimagine a new and different way so for more than a year Justin Evans and his partners have been negotiating with the city to make pinball legal in bars something he says can help reinvigorate the Maine this is such a great like way to hang out and enjoy they're so beautiful they're incredible cultural objects they're a blast to play the city now says those old laws need to change and they now realize that pinball won't necessarily lead you to a life of crime and they say they will change the laws to make sure this place can stay open it's a lot of fun somewhere in this city pinball wizard is smiling Rob Lurie CTV News alright so fast-forward to legalization and we opened in on New Year's in 2015 and finally in March of 2017 the bylaw was amended pinball machines now fall under the category of recreational games and their use is permitted in bars and no longer restricted so that was pretty easy you can see me being really happy and you're gonna thumbs up and it's a nice little tagline there from gangsters to hipsters pinball populace can always count on the media to do a great job to celebrate we had a legalization party where we gave away a pinball machine and also brought in a special guest mr. Roger Sharpe and his wife Ellen so they celebrated with us we did a ceremonial passing of the torch there you see the celebrating dressed up as Roger from the seventies and he had just passed the torch to me at this time and it's given a big thumbs-up so that was super exciting here you see us again and with our mascot at the bar the bear so we've got to Rogers and then this was just a weird coincidence at the exact time this picture was taken on the screen in the back we have the drunk history of history that was that was totally coincidental but I think the pinball gods were smiling on decided to make that happen so with all that now I'm going to talk about a little bit of the history behind North Star it's not something that we created as a name or a brand it's actually started in 1947 as one of the only King in pinball manufacturers ever before the by law came into effect before the Supreme Court of Canada ruled pinball illegal in 1947 there was an embargo against the importation of foreign pinball machines into Canada so these guys here are Gerard and Jacques Tremblay two young brothers seen in this photo they took the opportunity and founded the original North Star Coin Machine Company in the late 1940s they began to build pinball machines in Montreal to serve the Canadian market under the embargo and between the years of 1949 to 51 they built and sold what would become the only two pinball machines of significance ever manufactured in Canada that that I'm aware of unless they are there's something else but I've heard of it here you can see the first machine it was distinctly Canadian featuring a maple leaf on its cabinet advertised as the quote first Canadian design and machine retailed for $295 and was built on sand urbane Street in Montreal so pretty made when the embargo was lifted in 1951 the market became flooded with inexpensive machines from across the border and the brothers were forced to dissolve their company and by the end of it they'd only produced around 2000 machines you see the backlash is for the two machines they made sea breeze and Rishel you so photos of playfields with the blessing of the one brother who's still alive today Jacques Tremblay we were proud to continue the North Star legacy we adopted the name logo and various designs from the company you can see a sign that we have in the bar that we have and painted and it mimics a tag that we found under one of the playfields on the old machines that we have and those little dots are wiring diagrams as part of our grand opening on January 23 2016 we brought in the two original North Star machines fully restored and available for our guests to play and experience this forgotten part of Montreal history Jacques Tremblay son and granddaughter were present to celebrate the night picture here is mr. Tremblay son on the left and North Star Partner and pinball of story and Robert rocky on the right some more shots of the ritual you and both playfields and here's a wiring diagram under the ritual you play field that's been signed in 2013 I have no idea how many of these are left that exist in the world but I'd like to believe they're extremely rare I know of this one and one other but I do not think there are a lot of them out there whatsoever when you visit Northstar today the first thing you notice when approaching the front entrance is the sounds of bells and chimes which are emitted through an in speaker at the front door and they project down the clock so wherever you are you can hear them the sign picture here is actually a regulating recreation of the original Northstar company sign and that looks like this so this is the original sign which is currently on display at the Museum of Civilization in Quebec City you'll notice that we had to adapt the coin machine company parts to fit the current language laws of Quebec so those require that all signage has to be predominantly in French when the Tremblay brothers started their company in the 40s this law was not affected and business owners were free to choose and advertise their businesses in any language they desired today that's not the case in Quebec as we have extremely strict language laws here's a photo of our lineup shortly after opening as you can see the most recent game we had was a pin buck from 1986 from open until late 2017 we only operated classic and love shoes that changed last summer when we have a lot of requests from our customers who wanted to play newer machines different rules more toys you know the pinball of today so what we did last summer we installed one of the first style end machines on locations in Canada and more modern machines followed from 90s EMDs to the latest CERN walking up the stairs and stepping into North Star is - entering a sort of time machine only vinyl records are playing our attenders at this DJ is constantly clipping records behind the bar visitors can also take charge of the music choosing selections for mark curated jukebox of 45s once a track is selected on the jukebox a cutoff switch sends the signal to our stereo system and overrides whatever vinyl is being played behind the bar the jukebox is curated by Montreal musicians and artists and changes seasonally while the main focus is pinball Northstar is also home to one of the last color chemistry photo booths in Canada our photo booth uses real film and chemicals and develops your photo strip while you wait we are also home to the world's slowest disco ball a device that will make you a question if it is actually moving especially after a few beers the slowest that disco ball can normally rotate is one revolution per minute and utilizing a custom-built harness and gear set our disco ball moves at 1/100 of RPM per minute we're still waiting on certification from the Guinness Book of World Records but apparently they're not very interested in moving disco balls this is part of our current lineup we have 11 pinball machines and 1963 Williams major league pitching bat and a skee-ball machine we try to strike the balance between all eras of pinball and Road machines monthly to keep the lineup fresh we also have a section for PM's as we think they're an important part of pinball history and are super fun to play this is a shot of our tokens we decided to go with tokens for several reasons one of which was to have a small souvenir memento guests could take home with them to remember their time and/or son while most arcade tokens are shiny light and made of brass we decided to do something completely different our tokens are heavy and large they are made of copper like a penny so it will tarnish with time and use and have the look and feel of old currency the coins were minted at the Mississauga Mint in Ontario and a lot of extremely expensive to produce we think they are super cool so again we're a little crazy this is one of the many art installations that you can see at the North Star this is from the North Star manufacturing machine series this is a custom animated Lake box made by Montreal artist James ship Lucy James created several of these animated like box s boxes for the North Star using custom build circuits and electronics we currently have four different light boxes installed in various areas of the bar also filmmaker Marc looser created a supercut of pinball in movies that took years to compile the supercut plays on a loop on the front window of the bar so it's visible from the street that's what you saw in the picture with Roger the supercut had has hundreds of short clips from films all featuring pinball machines and while the initial cut was four hours long dr. was taken over by James it now runs over ten hours the super cut is made from three hundred and fifty two different sources and it dates back as far as 1933 so it's another neat piece of history targets you get this piece going out there light and basically the idea is to get a Williams little certain bumpers advances the arrow right or left which again lights various features on the deck now on to Williams to play now then watch the flipper where Charlotte all right that's for now and here is a shot of the original Gottlieb factory on Lake Street in Chicago you'll notice the giant got leave and company lettering on the factory sign above the front door we are huge Gottlieb fans at Northstar and when the factory closed in the early 80s a friend of ours purchased the original factory sign at auction we were able to convince him to let us display the one-of-a-kind artifact as the backdrop of our bar when we opened our doors in 2015 the Godley factory sign found itself on public display for the first time since the factory closed we're extremely proud to be able to share this amazing artifact with pinball lovers from around the world as much as we are a bar and a place to play involved we are also a sort of playable museum home to all kinds of pinball his room if you see the original coffee factory sign it wishes the backdrop of our bar now as North Star was trucking along and the law had been changed we decided that we were you know get into some adventures in operating pinball outside of the north side so our goal has become to install pinball machines all over the city our first crack was a Western bar downtown where we installed the lineup you see here everything was going great we were a few days away from our official launch party and I any tournament when yeah this happened so here you can see the five-alarm fire raging our machines were building we dealt with water below the neon lights there so this was a huge huge disaster we had only had the machines on locations for about two weeks the bar was really happy - people were really happy it was all going great and then you get something like this so what I would like to impart on you guys here if anybody's thinking of operating pinball machines in places that that are yours or not yours make sure you have the proper insurance and be prepared for the worst-case scenario because [ __ ] happens here's a little video I took of walking into the bar post fire so yeah we were really fortunate in that the roof of the entire bar had collapsed everywhere except over the pinball machines so again I think we have good pinball Karma and we were able to bring the machines out restore them and they will be back and running on the streets shortly and I can business here so now that we have seen the potential horrors of operating let's have a look at some of the positives here's a set up from earlier this month during the streets a little Montreal that we did Saint Laurent Boulevard the street that Northstar is on was closed to vehicle traffic and became a tree and walkway for 10 days we installed this shipping container and packed it with as many machines as we could fit the response was amazing and I learned a really valuable lesson as a pinball operator and that is even if people don't know they love pinball put them in front of our row of machines and magic happens I believe this set up to be the first of its kind and I haven't seen it before and since it was such a success we will be doing it again several times this summer at outdoor music festivals in Montreal from the very beginning of this journey my goal has been to bring pinball to the people and reintroducing the game that I love for future generations to fall in love with I believe that if we don't preserve the machines and make them available to the public as well as passing them on to future generations pinball as we know it will disappear I feel it is important to do my part to grow pinball culture and exposure and being able to wake up every day and work in pinball has been a dream come true for me as you walk down the stairs a North Star and get ready to re-enter the real world an abstract neon sign reading game over sends you on your way and with that thank you all for coming today I appreciate that you took the time to hear me and now I'd like to open up the floor for a Q&A I have a few t-shirts to give away to anyone who'll ask a question so now would be the time [Applause] 19:47 so they're very early fruit designed in flippers not yeah they were designed to have flippers the flippers weren't in the configuration that we know them today but those two games were seeking sequential games where you have to score a sequence which is basically getting hitting like one to eight and the flippers are at the bottom reversed so you can send the ball back up - yeah I can just pull up the picture so not the flipper configuration we're used to today but it was a different time so so originally my something that's been very successful for me in my life is persistence and if you want something and and you want to make it happen the way to go about it is continuing to try until it's a success so what I do with the city was just hound and bother and push and pull and it got to a certain point where they were like we gotta get this guy off our back we might as well legalize pen mark so in terms of you know I researched how Roger went about everything and you know for me it was just the notion of you know this has already been done here's the case studies it's it's pinball's legal in Toronto and Vancouver and all the other major cities in Canada we're lagging behind you know we need to change this it's a positive thing for the city it's a positive project and I basically tried to get the C on my side and when they weren't on my side I just continued to bother them until I got the results I wanted what size shirt okay so you got a link up to the bar for that I got Excel I was wondering how much restoring did you need to do with those so all of the know it would rails yeah definitely so the cap on the Rishel you machine that you see here the cabinet was completely redone from the pictures of the original playing field touched up we actually were able to get when we met with the Trombley brother who's still alive today shocked he had some old play feelings had some old back glasses so we were actually able to purchase like you can see him in the background there so yeah brand-new play field brand-new back glass that's it crew and then you know it basically what they did was copy got leave at the time so they used the Gothic design and Gothic parts and basically created their own Canadian and godly version that's awesome yeah so we were able to use you know the parts were there yeah the main thing was repainting and having two cabinets redone here and then getting the new playfield a new class one more question just about because they brought it to me um did you find I can't imagine it via Facebook so this the guy you see in the picture on the original new machine is one of my partners at the bar and Hugh Bruns Montreal pinball calm and he's a pinball asourian and he has access to all kinds of things that ice mere mortals also he's been in the industry for you know its entire life basically 30-plus years so he's got all kinds of crazy stuff he's also one of the main reasons why we're able to keep our machines running so smoothly we really pride ourselves on having machines that played exceptionally as well as cosmetically be really nice and we can do that because we have a great tech team that's awesome super awesome what size shirt oh I got larger extra do a large them any extra large questions in here I don't need sugar you have one or two questions I don't know first life would be great for myself in bother likely to have you know your event stuff but here every time I show up it sees me more people different people that hates probably first much as what what is your plan seemed to me this growth getting the for your events and to my questions of all people here oh you guys have a special connection I think it's remember that story how to seems that murders fit together sure so just just art basically I've always been like a grassroots do-it-yourself type of person and with opening the bar and building the pinball community the thing that I have found to be really helpful is just being super inclusive and inviting to everybody and trying to take I know sometimes with pinball events and tournaments there's a bit of a disparity between the people that are there to have fun and be social and the people who are there only to win so what I try to do is balance and have all these people meeting each other and interacting with each other and you know what we're doing with our adventures and operating now with the container that you saw and us getting help to music festivals a lot of it is about exposure and putting people in front of pinball machines and then they realize we have a lovely moment I can't believe I forgot how much fun this is another big part of it is educational I have people that come into my bar every day who don't know how to start again on a pinball machine you know and because we have games from all different eras you know the buttons in a different place on a coffee p.m. that is on a 79th valley than it is on a more modern machine so a lot of it is educational and exposure based and because there had been no pinball in Montreal for decades we are starting from scratch so I've been anticipating since we opened in 2015 a slow build and we've been on that track of a slow build and like you mentioned more people coming to events more people being exposed my partner Charlotte also runs Women's League to try to get out you know people who might not be comfortable in such a competitive environment so that's been really helpful as well and as for the second part of your question Vermont is very close to my trail and they have a great community there so we tend to travel back and forth to each other's events and we also created a couple years ago something called the Champlain Cup which is a Vermont versus Montreal competition that we do annually so we do a home away series so we do you know an event at their place and then an event at our place and then whoever wins the event is the you know the champion over that Champlain cup and then we continue that on so basically it's just about connecting with people who share your passion or interested in pinball who have shared your goals of growing pinball and not being shy to reach out to other people yeah it's called the pinball co-op it's a fantastic we're all going together and we'll their resources they friend to the commercial space they filled it with all their machines and they do events and have memberships and if you're ever in Vermont you should definitely go there and then when you are done you should come to Montreal and see me and I'll have a beer and play some games questions okay thank you all right thank you [Applause]