The many twists and turns of board game pioneer Milton Bradley’s life will be presented at the Windham Library from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. on Wednesday, May 20.
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| John Hutchinson, Business Reference Librarian at the University of Maine's Fogler Library in Orono, will offer a free presentation from 6 to 7 p.m. on Wednesday, May 20 at the Windham Public Library about the life of board game pioneer Milton Bradley. COURTESY PHOTO |
“I have done a series on inventors who were born in Maine,” he said, explaining that Bradley’s story is one of the tales of inventors from the state, which includes Chester Greenwood who famously invented the earmuffs, engineer Percy Spencer who is more than any other person the reason we all have microwave ovens in our kitchens, and Margaret Knight who designed groundbreaking industrial machinery and even automobiles. “It’s just me paying tribute to inventors who were born in Maine.”
“Milton Bradley has more of a pull for people because they know the name and associate it with games, and honestly, his life was a lot more interesting because it had so many ups and downs and a lot of twists,” Hutchinson added.
While Bradley became a prolific board game publisher, he began his career in technical drawing, becoming an expert in drawing blueprints and technical specifications. After working for the Patent Office to help prepare drawings of inventions for applicants, he decided to quit and become a publisher, “which didn’t go too far,” Hutchinson said.
“He had an impulsive streak,” he said. “Playing chess with a friend led him to decide to put together his first board game.”
Bradley’s game creation was rooted in his time spent in New England as a child and his family’s strong beliefs. His desire to include education in his games was paramount, after his parents used games to teach him.
“His guiding light for making games for people is that games should be educational. He didn’t like making games that were just chance,” Hutchinson said. “That was too close to gambling and that upset his traditional New England upbringing where his family didn’t allow gambling.”
“He wanted to have games that involved personal choice and strategy,” he added.
Bradley’s desire to maintain his traditions led to the creation of his first game, the Checkered Game of Life, in 1860. The game took players on a journey around a modified checkerboard, by rolling a six-sided numbered top (instead of dice that could be associated with gambling) as they seek to gather 100 points by landing on good spaces, which depicted positive virtues, and avoiding spaces that would cost a penalty. Hutchinson will use a poster-sized reproduction of the playing board to demonstrate how the game is played during the presentation.
“It’s very interesting how it was played, and how it figures into his philosophy of life and how it changed over the years,” he said. “He wanted board games to be uplifting and not mean-spirited, and certainly not something that would encourage bad behavior, but still be really, really fun.”
The drive to avoid his games being used in gambling also led to the creation of Author Cards. The game helped participants learn authors and their works, as players must pair the two and the one who gathers the most matched sets wins. The game went through many variations over time, and Hutchinson will have a complete set of the cards from 1908 for attendees to examine.
“The game was very controversial for the time as card games were frowned upon by polite society, which associated it with gambling,” he said. “Milton said ‘no, we can use a card game to teach people things.’”
The game had editions that covered Bible verses and American history, and versions of the game continued to be available through the 1970s, as Hutchinson recalls playing the game with his family.
“It actually got me to read things,” he said, adding that one of the authors in his set was Nathaniel Hawthorne, “I just thought The Scarlet Letter sounded like an interesting title and I read it based on the title. [The game] did work to get me to read.”
“He dedicated part of his business to making all manner of thing for kindergartens, including books, games, and even furniture and teaching supplies at low or no profit margin,” Hutchinson said. “By the time he passed, many of the prominent educators in the US said he was one of the largest driving forces for the kindergarten movement in the late 19th century.”
A former Windham resident, Hutchinson says that he is looking forward to returning to the library where he has many fond memories with his daughter.
“I used to bring my daughter to story time at the library every week,” he said. “It’ll be great to come back and visit the place where my little girl got her start being a reader and lover of libraries.”
The Windham Public Library is at 217 Windham Center Road in Windham. More details about Hutchinson’s presentation information can be found on the library’s website at www.windham.lib.me.us. <
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