A manually operated rotary type display device comprises a device body of an elongated bar-shaped configuration having a plurality of light emitting cells provided on the surface of the device body and arranged in alignment along a longitudinal direction thereof to form a light emitting cell array, an operation fulcrum member mounted on one end of the device body and rotatable about an axis perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the device body, a rotary marker secured to the operation fulcrum member for co-rotation therewith and having at least one mark, rotation detecting means for obtaining a relative angular position information between the device body and the operation fulcrum member and rotation speed information by detecting the mark of the rotary marker, storage means for storing an image data to be displayed by rotational scanning of the light emitting cell array, and display control means for reading out the image data sequentially from the storage means in synchronism with a detection signal by the rotation detecting means.