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In 1981, Atari released Centipede—a shoot ‘em up arcade game comprised of pixilated creepy-crawlies—created by Ed Logg and Dona Bailey, one of the first female game designers. To play the game, a player used a trackball controller and a single firing button to shoot at a large centipede as it wound its way down the screen and through a field of mushrooms. The player also needed to steer clear of spiders, fleas and scorpions. The game quickly became one of […]

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January 20, 2015

I’ve struggled to catch Saturday Night Live’s 40th season because I’m either out and about or asleep on the couch (usually the latter). But there’s a variety show that’s made for me—particularly due to its time slot and content—and it’s also celebrating an anniversary this year. The Mickey Mouse Club is turning 60.
Walt Disney intended his first foray into television, the Disneyland anthology series, to help fund and market his new theme park. Disneyland’s Davy Crockett miniseries (ABC, 1954–1955) enjoyed […]

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January 12, 2015

I recently listened to independent researcher Paul J. Hale’s Disney Story Origins podcast. In each episode, Hale seeks to understand the historical facts or origins of folklores, myths, and tales adapted by Disney for the big screen. Hale’s podcast presents amusing factoids and comparisons. In Disney’s Mulan, for example, the heroine has a token sidekick, Mushu, the fiery, feisty dragon. In Chinese folkore, Mulan does not have a sidekick. After her Uncle Mu Shu refuses to go to war, Mulan […]

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January 5, 2015

This Christmas an online commerce company (you know which I’m talking about) failed to cancel an order in my wish-list and so delivered to our front door a foot-long, remote-controlled, battery-powered, blimp-shaped, gyro-stabilized toy drone. At the museum, I’m up to my ears in thinking and writing about play and toys, but playing is another thing entirely. I hovered over sending the package back, but decided to keep it, putting my money where my mouth is, with hilarious, chaotic results.
Such […]

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January 2, 2015

Many will remember how recess became the highlight of a grade-schooler’s day.
At my own elementary school outdoor recess brought together classmates of all athletic abilities and creative talents. On the playground, the swing set filled up quickly with kids aiming to swing high and launch themselves into a pile of wood chips. Girls with gymnastic aspirations claimed the parallel bars to do flips or hang upside-down. Rambunctious boys clambered up the slide, flouting basic playground etiquette.
We scraped our knees and […]

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December 18, 2014

I lost a friend this past weekend.
I first got to know Ralph Baer a little over seven years ago when he reached out to us at The Strong to see if we might be interested in preserving materials documenting his lifework. We, of course, were interested—after all, he was a legend, the man who patented the idea of playing a game on a television, the creator of the first home video game system, and the inventor of Simon, one […]

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December 12, 2014

What comes to mind when you hear the word “animal”? Do you envision farm animals, your pet at home, or something a bit more wild? Perhaps you even think of a Muppet or two. Either way, it’s hard to ignore that animals fulfill a pretty big role when it comes to play.
As toddlers, many of us learn our animals and their corresponding sounds through that popular little ditty “Old MacDonald Had a Farm.” Animal stories can teach us valuable life […]

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December 12, 2014

The beloved sock monkey is easily recognizable, cute, silly, and soft, but where did it originate? According to Bonnie Krauss Connelly’s book, Everything’s Coming up Sock Monkeys!: Art, History and Business of the American Sock Monkey, the classic toy’s beginnings can be traced back to Rockford, Illinois, where Swedish immigrant John Nelson settled in 1852. By 1872, Nelson and his business partner, William Worth Burson, developed an automatic knitting machine that could close the heel and toe of a sock, […]

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December 5, 2014

I count the chance to watch A Christmas Story, a film based on the recollections of the radio raconteur and writer Jean Shepherd, as one of the distinct joys of the season.

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December 4, 2014