For the Amusement of Youth: Early Board and Card Games in Special Collections

Dean of Libraries Jerome Conley

Speaker Sarah Krom and exhibit curator Kim Tully

Dr. Krom speaking about the evolution of games

Kim Tully giving a tour of the exhibit

Kim Tully giving a tour of the exhibit

Giving the games a test run

Exhibit cases

Goodban's Game of Musical Characters.

Published in 1818.

Touring - The Famous Automobile Card Game.

Published 1926.

The New Game of Virtue Rewarded and Vice Punished, for the Amusement of Youth of both Sexes

Billy Bump's Visit to Boston

Published in 1888.

The Game of Kings

The history of the English monarchy made into a game. Published 1845.

Jack & Jill - Fly away Jill!

An Old-Maid style game, published 1894.

The Magic Ring

A fantasy-esque board game first published in 1796.

Tiddledy Winks

Published 1897

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.