When you hear the term “game show,” what comes to mind? A theme song? A colorful set? Enthusiastic hosts and fabulous prizes?
Whatever your answer, chances are you’ve watched a game show at least once. Growing up, my mother and I often watched game shows together and our viewing included everything from $25,000 Pyramid and The Price Is Right to Wheel of Fortune, as well as old black and white episodes of Password featuring the comedic—and now iconic—Betty White. Now daily […]
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Screen-Play: Too Cool for Ghouls? Dungeons & Dragons and Television Misfits
Why does television portray Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) as un-cool by putting it in the hands of nerds? Now celebrating its 40th anniversary, the iconic game grew out of the war-themed, strategy-heavy board games introduced in the 1950s by Avalon Hill, as well as from the miniature war games hobbyists enacted with figurines and battlefields crafted to scale. The Strong owns several copies of the original “white box” edition of D&D, created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, which implemented […]
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Jackie Robinson: A First in Baseball and in Toys
Before the 1950s, American toy manufacturers avoided favorable illustrations of people of color on toys and their packaging. But the middle of the 20th century saw the beginnings of positive examples—toys that purposefully utilized constructive African American likenesses. And some of the earliest appearances of this long-overdue imagery bore the portrait and endorsement of Major League Baseball’s first African American player, Jackie Robinson.
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The Best Toys Ever
What’s your favorite toy? I had the chance to talk about some of my favorites from the National Toy Hall of Fame with Gerri Willis on The Willis Report not long ago. The Fox Business network brought me to New York City as part of the lead-in to holiday toy shopping and to remind their viewers about classic toys. The segment’s theme, “Best Toys Ever,” felt like a perfect fit since celebrating toys with enduring play value is what the […]
A Mere Bagatelle: From Marbles to Pinball and Beyond
What does it take to play a game? Historic outdoor games like Duck on a Rock only require found stones. Other traditional outdoor games such as lawn bowls, bocce, and croquet used wooden balls. Early table versions of these games employed smaller ivory or wood balls or clay marbles. All these games have one thing in common: each involves knocking something aside with something else.
These games go back centuries and draw their basics from competitive games of shooting marbles. Billiards, […]
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Screen-Play: NBC’s Community and the National Toy Hall of Fame
Community is one of the most playful shows on television. The comedy about a study group at dysfunctional Greendale Community College not only features unconventional storytelling methods and an innovative visual style, but its characters actually play—all the time. And either its writers have been looking to The Strong for episode ideas, or the toys and games featured on the show are simply as iconic as our experts say they are. In honor of the show’s fifth-season premiere on January […]
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Lindbergh Lands in Paris! Toy Industry Gears Up!
When Charles Lindbergh made his famous New York to Paris flight from May 20 to 21, 1927, he became an overnight celebrity. Parisians mobbed Le Bourget airport immediately after his landing and even tore bits of souvenir fabric from the wings of The Spirit of St. Louis, his trusted airplane. But Lindbergh’s arrival back in the United States cemented his reputation as a true American hero, with a ticker-tape parade and his image as the first Time magazine “Man of […]
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Chess: Champion Names and Championship Games
Do you play chess? A World Chess Federation affiliate recently stated that the worldwide number of chess players equals the number of regular Facebook members and, in the United States, more people play chess than tennis and golf combined. Few sports foster such loyalty and global admiration.
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Tea or Monopoly with Mussolini?
Some games resonate with political history, and so do some movies. I watched Tea with Mussolini, director Franco Zefferelli’s 1999 semi-biographical film, and it reminded me of a game The Strong acquired in 2012. Monopoli (yes, that’s the correct spelling) is a 1937 Italian version from Monopoly’s heyday. What?! Monopoly is all about American-style capitalism and crushing opponents’ bank accounts! How did this happen under the Fascist regime of prime minister Benito Mussolini? The answer demonstrates Monopoly’s popularity in the […]