Last fall, I was down for the count with COVID. In between naps, I found the program “The Toys That Built America.” Learning how games like Scrabble and Clue and Jenga and Trivial Pursuit came to be was fascinating. Not to mention how we got Cabbage Patch Kids, Silly Putty, the Slinky, and so much more!

Philip Orbanes appears frequently in several episodes of the show, and at one point, I jotted down his name and the title of this book. THE GAME MAKERS is so much more interesting than I was expecting it to be! Orbanes begins in the late 1800s when a 16-year-old George S. Parker creates, fabricates, and sells a game called Banking on his own. He takes readers through the foundation of Parker Brothers, through two World Wars, family tragedies, the Great Depression, hostile takeovers, and more. I was hooked. The narrative is far from stuffy and academic. Orbanes fills readers in on the family and the business with the perfect number of trivia notes about games and society to keep one turning the pages.

THE GAME MAKERS was great fun–just like so many of the iconic games Parker Brothers is known for.