Just this last week (late September '01) I celebrated my thirtieth birthday. I spent all week getting my games in perfect working condition for the occasion. Everything was in working order except for a very recent addition to the collection—a Haunted House. Needless to say, we had a great time, and all of our guests seemed to really enjoy the game room. Nothing makes me happier than sharing my collection with friends and arcade enthusiasts.

I can still remember the very first time that I saw an arcade game. I was very lucky, and the event was actually captured on film. I was at a rehearsal dinner for my uncle’s wedding, and in those days you could find arcade games in the strangest of places. I sat down in front of a Pong machine and tried to figure out what exactly you were supposed to do. There was a dial, so obviously you were supposed to move that thing. But wait. It wasn’t moving anything thing on the screen. What was going on here? Oh. I understand. It costs money to play this game. I wonder if I can convince someone to give me a quarter. Maybe if I sit here and look cute, someone will help me out. Well, what did you want? I was only six!

Although my first encounter was brief, it did make an impression on me. When the early eighties rolled around, I became very caught up in the arcade game phenomena. Unfortunately I grew up in a very rural area and wasn’t able to visit arcades very frequently. That didn’t quash my interest; in fact it probably intensified it further! I tried to learn as much about video games as possible, collected the trading cards, and eventually convinced my parents to buy an Atari 2600. This fascination with video games and computer technology eventually influenced my career path.

Building my cabinet, however, only excited me more about video arcade games. It wasn’t long before I talked my wife (my dear, understanding wife) into letting me buy a fairly rare 1991 Space Ace. I converted the Space Ace back to its former glory and documented my project on www.DragonsLairII.com. Well, it wasn’t long before I found another “great deal” on a Q*Bert that I just couldn’t pass up. This particular machine appears to have a marquee for the unreleased “Faster, Harder, More Challenging” version of Q*Bert.

Three games quickly turned into six … and six games turned into twelve … and so on. In fact, I was running into some serious space issue. Luckily, I ran into a fellow name Anthony Pietrak. I was about to buy several more games, but I didn’t have any place to put them. As it turns out, Anthony said he could help me out by putting the overflow at his place. Well, we hit it off pretty well and it wasn’t very long before we decided that we might just want to start an arcade restoration company. Over the course of a few road trips, QuarterArcade.com was born.