- credit
- Ed Krynski — Design
- gameplay_feature
- Trap Holes ×25
- ipdb.corporate_entity_name
- J. H. Keeney and Company Incorporated
- ipdb_id
- 3300
- ipdb.image_urls
- ["https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-1.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-2.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-3.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-A3.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-4.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-5.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-6.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-7.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-8.jpg","https://www.ipdb.org/images/3300/image-9.jpg"]
- ipdb.notable_features
- Trap holes (25), Six cards. Drop-down cabinet.
- ipdb.notes
- This game was pictured along with other games in Cash Box Aug-10-1963 page 14 and all were identified there as having been produced between July 1962 and June 1963.
The Eastland Bill (S-1658, for James Eastland, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, formally known as the Gambling Devices Act of 1962), was signed by President Kennedy on October 18, 1962 and made effective 60 days later, in December 1962. It outlawed the interstate transportation of gambling devices. Undoubtedly Keeney was hit hard by this new legislation, as was Bally. Bally stopped making bingo machines as a result of this law and suffered a 40% drop in sales until the law was amended to allow them to export their bingo machines and they restarted production of their bingo line in August, 1963. Keeney, for their part, initiated production of three flipper pinball machines in 1963, after not having made one since 1959.
However, under this new law, 'Venus' being a bingo machine would not enjoy a wide stateside market. Keeney had long been exporting their gambling games to the UK and elsewhere abroad. According to Cash Box, Apr-6-63 page 74, Mar-Matic Sales, Ltd., Keeney's sole importer in the UK, hosted a small reception in London to introduce this game, having had received their first consignment of 'Venus' for their distributors. Interestingly, the article states the games they received made no payout.
The unhyphenated Marmatic Sales, Inc., of Baltimore Maryland, placed ads for this game and included a notice stating, "Many choice territories in countries outside U.S.A. available".
We previously showed a date for this game of April 1963. However, a distributor ad in Cash Box Jan-19-1963 page 67 was selling 'Venus' games brand new in their original crates for $645 each. The distributor was located in New Orleans, Louisiana, a city that was excepted from the ban, one of the few stateside locales where bingo machines could still be shipped.
- player_count
- 1
- technology_generation
- electromechanical
- year
- 1963