Mr. B, another question if I may. Although a great many of us were facinated and charmed by the Concentration electro-mechanical game board, I was wondering why indeed it was mechanical instead of manual. In light of the cost and the spector of failure during a live broadcast (and the eventual smoke and problems that later developed), what was the reasoning behind making the board electronic instead of simply letting the stage hands behind the board turn the trilons? Personally, I'm glad you went with mechanical, because the sounds of those motors engaging and stopping were like a sweet musical riff that greatly added to the personality of the show. The sounds still ring in my ears to this day! Again, thanks for your insight to this interesting and entertaining thread!
Wonderful question. As I mentioned, while doing the original run-thrus, I made a small wooden game board, which was small enough to sit on a table in a conference room. One person could turn those trilons around by hand. Time didn't matter to reveal the entire puzzle or to load and reload each new puzzle.
When we designed the giant game board, we needed two stagehands. Time was vital. Two guys would cut the loading and reloading time in half. Not only that but if it was manual, and a contestant called number 26, and number 10, stagehand one would have to bend way down to the right, and his arms could never reach way up to the left. Also, after a win, and other clues were still covered, the rest of the entire puzzle had to be revealed. Turning each of those thirty trilons would take a long time. The way we did it, we flicked a switch all thirty boxes flipped simultaneously. Same thing when returning all boxes to the box number side of the trilon -- which shielded the backstage unloading and loading the next puzzle.
Actually, there were two extra people behind the board we used. One was a stage manager, who relayed my cues from the control room -- that was a Union rule. The last was one of my production members (non-union) who made sure the proper puzzles and prize positions were loaded in their proper places. Remember all these people were working backwards - like reading from right to left.
You are so right -- as annoying as we thought the mechanical sound was, most people loved it.
