By Adam Nedeff, researcher for the National Archives of Game Show History
The two-part documentary Pee-Wee as Himself, now available for streaming on HBO Max, chronicles actor Paul Reubens’ unexpected rise to fame as the character Pee-Wee Herman. As the documentary explains, game shows had a small role in the rise of Reubens and his bizarre alter ego.
Reubens’ earliest shots at the big time came from The Gong Show. He and actress Charlotte McGinnis appeared on the daytime show as […]
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Chasing Brian Sutton-Smith and Gregory Bateson: Retracing Metaplay
I had the amazing opportunity through a G. Rollie Adams Research Fellowship to visit The Strong National Museum of Play in order to conduct research for my project on metaplay.
The purpose of this fellowship was to build on my dissertation research, specifically delving further into the theory of metaplay. In my review of the literature, metaplay was poorly defined and inconsistent in its (under)utilization in scholarship since eminent anthropologist Gregory Bateson loosely introduced the idea in a conference paper in […]
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Relational Play
Contemporary travel is a special kind of pandemonium, an admixture of excitement, fear, consumerism, and intense security measures. It can be a rather playful experience too, particularly in the U.S. The stops that took me from Pullman, Washington, where currently I live and work, to The Strong National Museum of Play are a case in point. First it was Pullman to Spokane, then it was Spokane to Las Vegas, where I transferred to a flight to Rochester, New York. To […]
“Luckiest” Man in Game Shows
By Adam Nedeff, researcher for the National Archives of Game Show History
A new movie coming out on April 4, The Luckiest Man in America, chronicles one of the most famous (some would say infamous) moments in game show history. Paul Walter Hauser stars as Michael Larson, an ice cream truck driver who made history in the strangest of ways as a contestant on Press Your Luck in 1984. If you want to be surprised by what happened, stop reading now, […]
Hilarious Game Show Answers
By Adam Nedeff, researcher for the National Archives of Game Show History
While going through some filing cabinets filled with memos and paperwork from the CBS game shows of the 1980s, we found a marvelous document titled, “I Heard It on the Pyramid-Vine.” The authors, Jerry Martz and Tom Buchanan, were CBS audio technicians. Both of them worked many tapings of The $25,000 Pyramid and The $100,000 Pyramid. As a refresher on these shows, celebrities and contestants teamed up for a […]
Toys and U.S. History in Playthings Magazine
Sometimes, the “a-ha” moment comes from what you don’t find. I came to The Strong Museum to search the earliest (1902–1929) issues of the toy industry journal Playthings for images and stories of the American past. I have spent the past two decades researching the American children’s literature industry, which regularly strived to convey this past to young readers in ways that served its moral and commercial interests. As a scholar new to the toy industry, I was surprised to […]
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Game Instructions: How Do You Learn to Play in an Arcade Room?
In August and September 2024, I had the chance to work in the exhibits and archives of The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York. Coming from Switzerland, a country in which the historical study and preservation of video games is still in its early stages, I was impressed by the wealth and the diversity of objects held by this institution.
As part of my doctoral research, I’m working mainly on video games designed for the domestic space, i.e. […]
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Let’s Talk About Something Fun—How About Magic?
From Dungeons & Dragons (1974) to Elden Ring (2023), modern games have asked us time and again to crack our knuckles, dust off our wizard cloaks, and test our magical mettle against fantasy’s most fearsome foes. But for all the magic our in-game spellbooks may contain, it was the pages of video game magazines that had the power to skyrocket an obscure game to national acclaim—or rain financial ruin upon a decorated studio for its latest flop. But how did […]
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Survey Says: How Family Feud Gets Its Answers
By Adam Nedeff, researcher for the National Archives of Game Show History
“We surveyed 100 people. The top six answers are on the board…”
You probably easily guessed those iconic lines come from Family Feud. But have you ever wondered who those 100 people are?
Writing material and building each episode is plenty of work for any game show. When Family Feud started production in 1976, the staff took on an even bigger challenge. Not only would they write the material (the […]
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