San Francisco Arcade Musuem. Execution was fun!

So Thursday saw Alex and me at Fisherman’s Warf. This time around we visited the back streets and stumbled upon an arcade museum. I laughed, figuring we would see old Pacman games (we did, he played) and some 1950-60 pinball machines. Imagine our surprise when we were met with machines from the late 1800’s and early 1900. There were fortune tellers, creepy laughing clown babies, dancing marionette people and weirdest of all, execution games.  I took some pictures of the strangest games; an opium den and two executions. 
I am not sure what the attraction of these games were. One of the games shows a man being hanged; I thought watching public executions were popular before the enlightenment. Apparently I was wrong.  
I tried to find the history of these games to no avail. All I learned is that these are from England and date to the late 1800’s. They were called penny arcades and over time evolved into boardwalk fun and finally the games we now have in our homes thanks to Atari and Nintendo.  I found some other strange games while surfing the net. Here is a link to a haunted house and Irish wedding. http://bit.ly/a4QpLm.  Oh and a creepy kid in a sailor suit. I am not sure this was designed as a game; rather it may have been used as a threat to unruly children. “Be good kids or I will put a penny in this game and make you watch the laughing crazy child”. I know the threat would work on me! Enjoy the pictures. Ignore the dates on the pictures.  My camera tends to make its own dates. I am working on a fix.

 Next blog: The Wax Museum of Fisherman’s Warf wants us to believe Jesus was white.

Off to San Fran again

I am off early in the AM to San Fransisco again. This time it is my son’s turn to have his heart checked and I will have my second check up. Hopefully I will be told I can return to work. I look forward to being useful again, but will miss hanging out at home If I could work from home I would jump at the chance; any suggestions on how to sucessfuly work from home? Are any of you lucky enough to work from home? If so tell us about it.

I am taking the book Shakespeare’s World by D L Johanyak. I finished Shutter Island yesterday; did not see that end coming. Not sure what else I will take as I am short on paperbacks.

I will return Sunday hopefully with stories from the big city and more pictures to post. I love the Bay Area and am looking forward to the sea food and cable cars. Not looking forward to the traffic and hospital.

Happy Reading and don’t forget to spread the word about the Dracula in Love book giveaway.

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