The American use of a slot machine showing a winning combination as an amulet for gambling luck is fairly new and seems to me to coincides with the rise in the number of Indian-run casinos in the United States. This charm is used as a key ring. It depicts a slot machine set at the lucky combination 777 (a variant of lucky number 7) and spewing forth a jackpot of golden coins. It is made of false-cloisonne, in which glitter and acrylic resin mimic enamel. It was purchased in 1997 at a gas station in Garberville, a small town in northern California, while en route to a logging protest.
The slot machine hitting the jackpot represents the slot player's winning wish fulfilled -- and as such it is symbolically related to other wish fulfillment gambling charms, such as the spread of playing cards used by poker players, the pair of dice throwing lucky number 7 used by crap shooters, the horse head in a horseshoe used by race track bettors, and the money bag, all of which are popular amulets for bringing on gambling luck.
Here is a quick link-list to the illustrated Lucky W pages containing key chain and key ring amulets:
SEARCH THIS SITE: a local search
engine and a named link to each Lucky Mojo page
Lucky Mojo Site
Map: a descriptive entry-level index to the whole Lucky Mojo
pile
Lucky W Amulet
Archive Home Page: an online museum of folk-magic charms
Sacred Sex Home
Page: essays on tantra yoga, karezza, sex magic, and sex worship
The Sacred
Landscape Home Page: essays on archaeoastronomy and sacred
geometry
Freemasonry for
Women Home Page: a history of mixed-gender Freemasonic lodges
The
Lucky Mojo Curio Co.: manufacturers of spiritual supplies for
hoodoo and conjure
The Comics
Warehouse: a source for back-issues of comic books and trading
cards
catherine
yronwode, the eclectic and eccentric author of all the above web
pages
nagasiva
yronwode: tyaginator, nigris (333), nocTifer,
lorax666, boboroshi, !
The Lucky Mojo
Esoteric Archive: captured internet files on occult and
spiritual topics
copyright © 1995-2002 catherine yronwode. All rights reserved.
Send your comments to: cat yronwode.