monopoly game

[Cross-posted (minus audio) from letters to sg because I thought y'all might find it interesting.]

The popular story of the origins of Monopoly – the bigger-than-Jesus Parker Brothers board game – has become enough a part of American cultural literacy that it has developed an apocryphal (and almost certainly fictive) crust. (For example, I was pretty sure that someone once told me that it was invented by a hobo or something.) But it turns out that the real story is better than any of the myths (and much better than the commercially-acceptable "official" history).

Part of the problem is that the popular story leaves a good 30 years off of the game's history, and part of it is that the official story doesn't feature any Quaker women. But the biggest problem with the popular narrative is that it leaves out the quirky and unique contributions of the individuals and communities who played the game before Charles Darrow "invented" it in 1934. The American Interest gives us a glance at the real story in "Monopolizing History". You really must bookmark the AI piece to read when you have a few minutes. For now, here's a quote that highlights one of my favorite tidbits about the game's original designer and her original designs.