January 27 – May 16, 2014
Reception, March 12, 2014 4-6 PM
Due to advances in manufacturing and printing technologies and an expanding middle class with more leisure time, the mass production of board, table and card games exploded in the 19th century. This exhibit traces the origins of today’s gaming industry, highlighting the products of the golden age of commercial game production in the United Kingdom, the United States, and beyond from the 1790s to the 1920s. Highlights of the exhibit include several hand-colored board games from England circa 1800, early games and puzzles produced by leading American game manufacturers, Milton Bradley, the McLoughlin Brothers, and the Parker Brothers, and an early French version of the popular magnetic fish pond game.
A reception, free and open to the public, will be held on March 12 from 4:00 – 6:00 PM and will include a talk on games and gaming by Sarah Fay Krom, Visiting Assistant Professor in the Armstrong Institute for Interactive Media Studies, and a gallery talk by Special Collections Librarian and curator of the exhibit Kimberly Tully.