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Pinball Hall of Fame Turns to GoFundMe to stay afloat

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Las Vegas’ Pinball Hall of Fame
Illustration: Shutterstock

The quirky and beloved Pinball Hall of Fame is apparently in trouble. Its long-planned expansion has been derailed by the effects of COVID-19, according to operator Tim Arnold. So the Las Vegas Pinball Collectors Club is seeking to raise $200,000 on GoFundMe (bit.ly/2XRwi4N) to save it. At press time, 878 donors had donated $49,000.

Pre-pandemic, the group says, it borrowed $1.7 million to move from the current 1610 E. Tropicana Ave. location to a new home on the Strip, which would house more than 700 pinball machines. According to the GoFundMe page, the building is 96% finished, but “because [of] an almost total collapse of the tourist traffic in Las Vegas, we are going to fall short of having the money to finish.” Without a cash infusion, it continues, the group must vacate by May 6, and the “whole project will end with no home for all the machines.”

“We started this project on a shoestring and have been VERY frugal all along,” Arnold writes on the GoFundMe page. “We are very lucky that the COVID has not infected any of us, but it has WRECKED our finances. Please help with a donation.”

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