I picked up some flip panel displays on ebay. They used to be common in the departure boards of train stations - you can still sometimes see them (Penn Station NYC still had them as late as 2003). The ones I purchased came from CBS, apparently used as score displays in game shows.
These sturdy old units used manly electrical connectors
Opening them up reveals an ingenious drive mechanism from the days of primitive electronics. The digits are of course spring-tensioned panels on a wheel. Rotating the wheel displays different digits - 12 are possible though these show 0-9 plus two blank panels. The panel wheel is driven by a small 120V AC motor. How does the display know when to stop? The panel wheel is connected to a 12-position switch (the thing under the motor with all the wires coming out of it). Now here is where the magic starts. The 12 wires corresponding to the 12 display positions are attached to the big connector in the back. The display operator selects the digit to display by grounding the approrpiate wire coming out of the swich. The output of the switch is connected to the DPDT relay (the blue thing to the right of the motor). The relay ground is connected to the switch and normally provided with +24V power - and therefore is enrgized when the flip panel display is in the selected position.. The AC motor is energized when the relay is off. Therefore, the motor - and therefore the panels - will turn until the selected digit is shown and the relay is energized, turning off the motor. The old game shows provided the illusion of a fancy computer tabulating the scores when really it was some dude sitting at a control console consisting of a bunch of switches.
Here is a closeup of the switch linkage
On the bottom, there are fine-tuning adjustments
Here is a closeup of the panel wheel
I could have made a clock from these ... but I already have so many. I decided to do something a little different - make a flip-panel animations like some of those antique hand-cranked movies. I'm not an artist and actually have zero talent, so I had to enlist the help of some of my actual artist friends. This is a sequence from Yuliya Lanina, its a component of an animation she made.
Next is an experiment created by Ishmail Sandstroem. Ishmail wasn't happy with the result, but I like it.