Jun 2, 2023 04:50 PM
(This post was last modified: Jun 2, 2023 04:51 PM by C C.)
https://www.startribune.com/anti-monopol...600279625/
EXCERPTS: Somewhere beneath southern Minnesota lie the remnants of about 40,000 board games once created and sold as an antiestablishment alternative to mega-selling Monopoly.
Manufactured in Mankato, the game Anti-Monopoly found success in the mid-1970s amid America's rampant inflation and institutional distrust. Then, much like in Monopoly, the ownership class quashed the competition.
[...] Anti-Monopoly was the creation of Ralph Anspach, who in 1973 was teaching economics at San Francisco State University. [...] Anspach played Monopoly in Czechoslovakia as a child...
[...] "The board game rewarded something in play that hurt people in reality," Anspach thought, ...struck by a realization: "He could create an anti-monopoly game of his own." With help from his family, he set out developing a game that rewarded breaking up monopolies, not building them.
Like Monopoly, Anti-Monopoly is a square board with spaces around the edges representing conglomerates — oil and gas companies, steel and tire makers, utilities and railroads. It was complete with play money, "mailbox cards" and "indictment chips."
Instead of buying up assets and charging rent, players "take the role of federal case workers bringing indictments against each monopolized business in an attempt to return the state of the board to a free market system," according to the game's Wikipedia page.
[...] Parker Brothers noticed. The company had made a massive worldwide hit out of Monopoly after purchasing its trademark in 1935. [...] Anspach received a letter in early 1974 from Parker Brothers, demanding he change his game's name, according to Pilon's book. Anspach refused.
Parker Brothers sued Anspach for trademark infringement. The firm won an early round of the litigation...
On July 5, 1977, as news cameras rolled, "about 40,000 copies of the games, some already assembled in plastic-wrapped boxes, others still in pieces, were trucked ... to the landfill, where they were ground beneath the tracks of a bulldozer and buried..."
[...] Anspach's court victory came too late to save the unsold copies of Anti-Monopoly. Anspach won a settlement from Parker Brothers and regained full use of the Anti-Monopoly name. Subsequently, Mankato Corporation for a time printed an updated version called Anti-Monopoly II.
Anti-Monopoly is now produced by San Francisco-based University Games... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPTS: Somewhere beneath southern Minnesota lie the remnants of about 40,000 board games once created and sold as an antiestablishment alternative to mega-selling Monopoly.
Manufactured in Mankato, the game Anti-Monopoly found success in the mid-1970s amid America's rampant inflation and institutional distrust. Then, much like in Monopoly, the ownership class quashed the competition.
[...] Anti-Monopoly was the creation of Ralph Anspach, who in 1973 was teaching economics at San Francisco State University. [...] Anspach played Monopoly in Czechoslovakia as a child...
[...] "The board game rewarded something in play that hurt people in reality," Anspach thought, ...struck by a realization: "He could create an anti-monopoly game of his own." With help from his family, he set out developing a game that rewarded breaking up monopolies, not building them.
Like Monopoly, Anti-Monopoly is a square board with spaces around the edges representing conglomerates — oil and gas companies, steel and tire makers, utilities and railroads. It was complete with play money, "mailbox cards" and "indictment chips."
Instead of buying up assets and charging rent, players "take the role of federal case workers bringing indictments against each monopolized business in an attempt to return the state of the board to a free market system," according to the game's Wikipedia page.
[...] Parker Brothers noticed. The company had made a massive worldwide hit out of Monopoly after purchasing its trademark in 1935. [...] Anspach received a letter in early 1974 from Parker Brothers, demanding he change his game's name, according to Pilon's book. Anspach refused.
Parker Brothers sued Anspach for trademark infringement. The firm won an early round of the litigation...
On July 5, 1977, as news cameras rolled, "about 40,000 copies of the games, some already assembled in plastic-wrapped boxes, others still in pieces, were trucked ... to the landfill, where they were ground beneath the tracks of a bulldozer and buried..."
[...] Anspach's court victory came too late to save the unsold copies of Anti-Monopoly. Anspach won a settlement from Parker Brothers and regained full use of the Anti-Monopoly name. Subsequently, Mankato Corporation for a time printed an updated version called Anti-Monopoly II.
Anti-Monopoly is now produced by San Francisco-based University Games... (MORE - missing details)