Santa Anna Token Project

Santa Anna Token Project

The purpose of the Santa Anna Token Project is to collect as much information about this token, the history and documents while documenting the known tokens.

Santa Anna update 8/1/25

This is what was known:

Santa Ana, CA location was a planned Chuck E Cheese Pizza Time Theater in 1979. Tokens were received at the Pizza Time Theater Corporate office, this was the main office used for Pizza Time Theater Inc between 1978 to late January of 1979. It was located at 10060 Bubb Rd, Cupertino CA 95014. It was noticed that the Santa Ana (spelled Santa ANNA on the token) and the tokens were returned to the manufacturer for re-stamping, scrap or whatever. The lease for the location never got signed, and the tokens were never put in circulation. One of the employees had about 30 samples removed from the shipment. Since the lease never got signed there were never any other Santa Ana tokens made.

This is the update:

Here is a little timeline history of Chuck E Cheese Pizza Time Theater that will help explain a little bit more of the Santa Ana, California location token and history.

The first Pizza Time Theater to open, was the San Jose location at 370 S Winchester Blvd on May 17, 1977.

Pizza Time Theater home office in Cupertino opened in 1978 until January 1979.

The second Pizza Time Theater location was also opened in San Jose at 1371 Kooser Rd on December 2, 1978.

The second Pizza Time Theater home office in Sunnyvale opens in February 1979 and closes in March 1984.

The third Pizza Time Theater location was in Concord at 1975 Diamond Blvd and opened in May 1979.

The fourth Pizza Time Theater location opens in Sacramento located at 7020 Stockton Blvd in the Florin Mall on August 14, 1979. This is important!! The Sacramento token is known to have 3 different reverse dies.

The first has full reverse denticles and thin reverse fans on the bottom below the date.   

The second has a thicker date and thicker reverse fans below the date. 

The third has missing reverse denticles on 70% of the token and a small tick from the circle around 25C to the bottom of the E in WE. The missing denticles is due to grease on the dies. Technically, an error, the token was struck through a grease filled die. 

This third reverse is shared with five of the known Santa Anna tokens. Two tokens are known to have full reverse denticles (also known as an early die state, EDS) and three tokens are known to have partial reverse denticles (also known as a mid die state, MDS).  

So, that means the Santa Anna tokens were made BEFORE the Sacramento tokens. I'm thinking, quite close to the same time as the Sacramento tokens. So close that I'm also thinking that the mint just changed the obverse Santa Anna die to the new Sacramento die without even changing the reverse die in the token press.

Since the mint continued to use the same reverse dies, more grease got onto the dies and by the time the Sacramento tokens were made with 75% of the denticles were missing (also known as a late die state, LDS).

There is only one Santa Anna token that has a different reverse die from the other five known. It has different characteristics.

Although it does not have the tick from the circle to the bottom E in WE, it does have a thicker date and mushy reverse fans, especially under the date. That die also appears to have been reused as well, a new die would have more thinner detailed fans and thinner date. The second reverse also exhibits a die chip on the dot between the fans above the I in PIZZA.

Now, there are two different obverse dies as well. The five Santa Anna tokens that are paired with the Sacramento reverse die, has thinner letters in Santa Anna and the first A in Anna points to the lower right E in Chuck E. 

The second obverse die has thicker letters in Santa Anna and the first A in Anna points to the middle of the E in Chuck E.  

So, the Sacramento location opened on August 14, 1979 which means the Santa Anna and the Sacramento tokens were made at the same time and probably ordered at the same time, sometime in July of 1979.

There were a total of five Pizza Time Theater locations that were cancelled in 1979-1980. They include, Phoenix, Portland, Seattle, Salinas and of course, Santa Ana.

I believe the Sacramento tokens were delivered to that location.

As previously thought, the Santa Anna tokens could not have been delivered to the Cupertino home office location. Since they were made in July, and Cupertino closed in January 1979, they had to be delivered to the Sunnyvale home office location. The Santa Ana location was never built, or the lease was never signed, so the tokens were NEVER put into circulation. No additional tokens were made and the mis-spelled tokens were returned to the manufacturer.

Sunnyvale California Corporate Office 

In an email between Travis and myself, he told me that Roy Hudnell had two tokens that he purchased from a former employee Jack Campbell around 2000. Then a cashe of them turned up in the Midwest in Michigan. As the story goes, an employee discovered them when doing token pulls. Another 4-5 tokens was discovered in that manner. That story make sense, as I purchased one from a person in Michigan who ONLY had the Santa Anna token. The individual who sold the token said that was "the only Chuck E Cheese token they had, and they forgot to spend it playing a game before leaving a Chuck E Cheese". Around 2010, a token appeared on eBay in which Travis purchased because he "didn't want to pass up the chance to own one". Shortly after, a few more tokens from the same seller were posted and sold on eBay, this is when Roy Hudnell picked up the third token.

I still believe it's possible that an employee had 30 examples removed before they were sent back to the mint. As far as where the other 24 Santa Anna tokens are, it keeps me wondering. When and where will they turn up. The last known example was discovered in December 2024. How many are in collections? Are there others out there yet to be discovered? Or did something catastrophic happen and they all got destroyed?

If you have any information, documents, photos or anything else related to or the actual Santa Anna Token or location. Please email me at overdate1@verizon.net Subject: Santa Anna Token Project  

1) Internet ad of Roy Hudnell offering Bounties for certain Chuck E Cheese Tokens, 

2) Roy's Ad for needing 12 Pizza Time Theater Tokens, 

3 and 4) Pictures of some of Roy's binders of CEC Tokens

The Santa Anna Tokens