Ever since he was a young boy, Rob Berk played the silver ball.
“Probably [my] first memories of pinball were growing up as a young guy, maybe 5 or 6 years old, and going in the basement of my parent’s home and seeing this contraption down there and not knowing what it was,” Berk said. “It was a pinball machine.”
Berk began collecting in the 1970s, and today he’s the proud owner of more than 1,000 machines dating back to the 30s to the present.
When his collection became too big for the warehouse of his family’s business, he discovered a vacated grocery store on North State Street in Girard, about six miles northwest of Youngstown. The price was right, so he bought the building to store his games.
“I’m thinking to myself, this is such a crazy thinking, ‘I'll put the games in there. I'll have a key. Maybe once a week, I'll come here, play a couple games and turn the lights off and go home,’” he said. “My wife said, ‘You're crazy! If you're going to build this place, why don't you build it for the general public to come enjoy?’”
The Past Times Arcade opened to the public in June 2023 with more than 400 of Berk’s pinball games on display and available to play.
However, some of the oldest games from the 30s are only for admiring.
“The very first game was a game called ‘Whiffle,’ which was produced in Youngstown, Ohio. I have the game here,” he said. “A very simple game, very simplistic, no electricity, no flippers.”
Berk also has the first pinball game to ever use flippers, which are now the standard for redirecting the ball on the playfield. It’s called “Humpty Dumpty” and was made in 1947.
“It was created by a guy named Harry Mabs, and he came up with this thought, this idea of these flippers,” he said. “When he put that on the game, it just turned the industry upside down because, all of a sudden, you can keep a ball alive longer and a lot of other people start copying the flippers.”
Berk’s pinball pride and joy is his international collection, featuring rare games from Spain and Italy.
“The artists are unique. The layout, the playfield design is unique,” he said. “But that's what makes this hobby to me so interesting is those oddball games you just don't see everywhere.”
Berk’s daughter, Reilly, surprised him earlier this summer when Past Times celebrated its one-year anniversary.
“My daughter says, ‘Hold on a second. I want to give my dad something,’” he said. “It's a certificate from the [Guinness World Records] recognizing me and honoring me for having the largest single collection of pinball machines. That was a great honor, a great surprise.”
Berk said the local community of Trumbull County and neighboring Mahoning has taken to the place.
“The more the people come in here, they're just awestruck by it,” he said. “They really didn't know what to expect… You got to see it to believe it.”
