In 1934, Charles B. Darrow of Germantown, Pennsylvania, was unemployed. To amuse himself and pass the time, he created a board game that provided the possibility of fame and fortune.
He originally presented it to the executives at Parker Brothers but they rejected the game due to “52 design errors!" But Mr. Darrow wasn’t daunted. Like many other Americans who have been unemployed, his situation and personal passion for the game inspired him to produce it on his own.
With help from a friend who was a printer, Mr. Darrow sold 5,000 handmade sets of the game to a Philadelphia department store. People loved it! But as demand grew, he couldn’t keep up with all the orders and came back to talk to Parker Brothers again. The rest, as they say, is history! That game is called MONOPOLY. Today, it’s the best-selling board game in the world, sold in 111 countries and produced in 43 languages including Croatian.
In its first year, 1935, the MONOPOLY game was the best-selling game in America. And over its 77-year history, an estimated one billion people have played!
- Over 275 million games have been sold worldwide.
- More than six billion little green houses and 2.25 billion red hotels have been “built” since 1935.
- The most expensive version of the game was produced by celebrated San Francisco jeweler Sidney Mobell. Valued at $2 million, the set features a 23-carat gold board and diamond-studded dice.
- In 1978, the Neiman Marcus Christmas catalog offered a chocolate version of the game priced at $600.
- In the book and the movie One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, McMurphy joins the patients in a game of MONOPOLY. In the movie, the game gets so heated that McMurphy ends up hosing down the other players with cold water.
- The longest game in history lasted 70 straight days.
- And of course now available as an iPhone app.
So what are you doing while you’re unemployed?
