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Episode 70 - Legendary Women of the Pinball Industry
PodcastAnalysis updated yesterday50 min listen
Highlights
- Suzanne Ciani was the first woman composer and first woman voice in pinball, hired by Bally for the game Xenon
- Margaret Hudson was the sole credited artist on Bally games 8-Ball Deluxe and Spectrum and worked across multiple manufacturers including Data East and Stern for 20+ years
- Zofia Bill Ryan was the first woman lead mechanical engineer in pinball history, working at Williams 1990-1996
- Kristina Donofrio is the only woman to receive a solo programming credit on a pinball game (Data East Star Trek)
- Shelly Sackes was a day-one employee at Data East Pinball alongside Gary Stern and Joe Kaminkow and worked there for over 40 years until retiring in 2022, dying of cancer six months later
- Linda Deal was specifically hired by Greg Freres and was instrumental in teaching the Williams/Bally art department how to use new computer art tools in the early 1990s
- Zofia Bill Ryan was laid off from American Pinball in January 2025
- Karen Tribula created and compiled every manual for every Williams pinball game and these manuals represent the high water mark for pinball machine documentation
- Jeanine Mitchell and her husband Constantino were credited together on all Gottlieb/Premier games from mid-1980s until Gottlieb closed in 1996
- Kristina Donofrio worked at Williams for only two years (1980-1981) on sound programming, then had a ten-year gap before re-emerging at Data East in 1991
Notable quotes
“highlighting women shows that we've been here all along throughout the industry and we do cool shit, too”
“without Shelly, there would be no Stern Pinball. Shelly embodied our company's entrepreneurial, get-it-done spirit. More importantly, she was one of my closest and dearest friends, and I will miss her.”
“Linda brought the knowledge and the skills, and she took all of the old cavemen and taught them how to use these new tools”
“I miss when there were these cool, weird things happening on the playfield. And yes, sometimes the ball, the missed multiball doesn't come off the magnet or whatever. But the fact that it existed, like I want to see more cool stuff like that.”
“missed multiball is like the best thing in pinball. Like I truly like think it's crazy that it hasn't been done again”
“to hear Gary Stern talk, he's a salesman. He's always selling. It's always the newest game on the line. It's the best game we've ever made. Here's what you bought. Here's what you need to buy next. So to hear him sort of turn that off and get personal about Shelly, I think it speaks a lot to what she brought to the table”
“I think she's probably most known for those John Popadiuk art packages, the ones on Theater of Magic and Cirqus Voltaire, because she was the lead sole credited artist on those games”
“the bias, like you said, intentional or unintentional, it's definitely there”
“I would love to have her on the show. So if anyone knows how to reach Margaret Hudson, please reach out.”
“We wouldn't have pinball today without her and her hard work. Gary Stern himself said it.”
Entities
- American Pinball· company
- Bally· company
- Data East USA Inc.· company
- Stern Pinball· company
- Williams· company
- Christina D'Onofrio· person
- Constantino Mitchell· person
- Gary Stern· person
- Greg Freres· person
- Isaac Ruiz· person
- Jeannie Mitchell· person
- Jeremy Packer· person
- Joe Kaminkow· person
- John Popadiuk· person
- Karen Tribula· person
- Linda Deal· person
- Margaret Hudson· person
- Sam Stern· person
- Shelly Sackes· person
- Suzanne Ciani· person
- Zoe Vrabel· person
- Zofia Bill Ryan· person
