1990: New Jersey businessman takes over, begins cleaning up the balance sheet at debt-laden Ballyīy October 1990, Bally was defaulting on loans and swimming in debt as it struggled to turn a profit at its casinos. “Despite the Bally name, Tomfoolery is not some pinball paradise for gamesters who tend to play through mealtime,” Vettel said.Īll in, buying three casinos put Bally $1.6 billion in debt, as Wall Street began to sour on the former pinball company turned conglomerate. The first Tomfoolery restaurants opened in Chicago Ridge, Park City and Lombard, garnering generally positive reviews from then-Tribune restaurant critic Phil Vettel, who praised the “something-for-everyone” menu, the “appropriately glitzy” decor and the relatively unobtrusive video game room. The plan was to convert the 24 restaurants to an arcade-themed concept called Bally’s Tomfoolery as a prelude to national expansion. Hoping to compete with restaurant gaming meccas like ShowBiz Pizza Place, Bally announced in August 1981 that it was buying Barnaby’s Family Inns, a Chicago-based pizza chain, for about $3.6 million in Bally’s stock. O’Donnell was replaced as CEO by Robert Mullane, a Bally vice president and president of its distribution subsidiary, who presided over a decade of even more ambitious diversification, with decidedly mixed results. O’Donnell agreed to step down in December 1979 as Bally’s Park Place opened. Investigators alleged that Gerardo (Jerry) Catena, a reputed New Jersey mob boss, was a “hidden partner” in O’Donnell’s 1963 takeover of Bally.
But as Bally got closer to opening its Park Place casino in 1979, New Jersey state investigators raised concerns that the original investor group organized by O’Donnell had mob ties that precluded his involvement in the new casino. When Atlantic City, New Jersey, legalized gambling in 1976, Bally CEO O’Donnell was among the first to seize the opportunity. Belmont Ave., and hit the ground running with an array of new entertainment offerings when the war ended.īally's Atlantic City in May 2015.
Backed by government funding, Bally expanded its plant at 2640 W. World War II: Bally shifts to defenseĭuring World War II, Bally shifted from making pinball and slot machines to producing detonator fuses and gun sights to support the war effort. By the mid-1930s, Bally branched out into slot machines and phased out the punchboard business. The name Bally Manufacturing soon supplanted parent company Lion as the primary moniker in advertisements and popular culture. Ballyhoo became a hit, selling more than 50,000 units within the first seven months. In 1932, he built his first pinball machine at the company’s fourth-floor offices on Erie Street in River North. Advertisement 1932: Ray Moloney introduces Ballyhoo, a pinball machine that launches an empireĪ Cleveland native who moved to Chicago with his family, Ray Moloney launched a new company in 1931 called Lion Manufacturing that made punchboards - games of chance that used a stylus to reveal prizes - when he was captivated by a pinball machine he saw at a punchboard convention.
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