Dispensing mechanism for articles in two abutting front to back stacks

Claim 1

An article vending mechanism comprising: a frame having a pair of upright side walls, an upright front wall, and an upright rear wall, said front and rear walls interconnecting said side walls and spaced sufficiently that two articles can extend end-to-end therebetween, said side walls spaced apart a distance less than the combined widths of said articles such that front and rear stacks of articles are arranged in staggered formation, the articles of the front stack engaging the articles of the rear stack; article release means including a pair of laterally spaced rods pivotally mounted to said frame and extended between said front and rear walls, each rod disposed below a stack for supporting said articles within said stack, said rods movable laterally alternately each from an article holding position to an article releasing position such that a pair of abutting articles are released for vending with each lateral movement of each rod; a shelf pivotally mounted at one end only to said front wall and disposed below only the front stack of articles, said shelf operable in one position to catch and hold an article dropped from said front stack by movement of each of said rods and in another position to release the article held; an anti-theft meMber mounted to said article release means and disposed below only the rear stack of articles to block manual access to said shelf, said member movable away from beneath said rear stack in response to lateral movement of said rod; and customer actuated electric means operably connected to said rods and to said shelf for moving said rods and shelf in sequential relationship to each other such that each customer actuation effects a release of an article from the vending mechanism.