This device consists of a wooden cash register between two wooden and glass display cases. Amounts are entered by dropping balls into holes for 1, 2, 5,10, 25, and 50 cents, and 1 and 5 dollars. Another hole is labeled "Ticket". From these holes at the back of the machine, the balls slide forward and accumulate in slots on top of the cash drawer. Pop-up numbers above the holes rise up when a ball is dropped. Neither these numbers nor for the slots have any cover.
This object resembles several devices manufactured in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in Greenfield, Ohio. It is quite similar to a “cash indicator and register” patented by J. H Schnarrenberger of Greenfield in 1891 (U.S. patent 465732). These cash registers were manufactured by firms associated with John M. Waddel (also spelled John M. Waddell), whose primary business was in the building of display cases and other business furniture.
Compare to the description of the Waddel, Simplex, and Sun cash registers given in Crandall. Papers of the Waddell Company are at the Ohio Historical Society. By 1929, the Waddell Company was selling a combination of three adjacent display cases, with a money drawer under the shallower middle case. There was no cash register in this later item.
References:
Richard L. Crandall, The Incorruptible Cashier, Vestal, N.Y.: Vestal Press, 1988, vol. 1, pp. 133–147.
Waddell Company, Show Cases, Store Furniture Catalogue No. 109, Greenfield, OH: Waddell Co., Inc., 1929, pp. 10–11.
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