Stephanie Kalinowski, ’19, Student Life Editor
Monopoly has been one of the most popular board games world-wide throughout history. It can be said that Monopoly is one of the most frustrating and time consuming board games, which is why when Monopoly was first presented to marketers, it was denied.
According to the website Mashable, the longest game of Monopoly recorded is 70 days straight. Freshman Logan Foust laughed and said, “I [have not] ever actually finished a game of Monopoly.”
Little do many people know, the first Monopoly game made was in 1903 by a woman named Elizabeth Maggie. It was her way of protesting the monopolists during her time, and was practically made to demonstrate the evils of capitalism. The idea was then stolen by a man named Charles Darrow, he designed his own version and sold it to the Parker Brothers to market on Nov. 5, 1935. This made Charles Darrow so rich that he gave up his original occupation: heating trade for hothouse hobby, in order to grow orchids.
With the economy growing, it is obvious that there had to be many additions and modifications to the original game. In order for Monopoly to be something that people still talk about, there had to be different games and ideas that relate to Monopoly, but also relate to today’s world. For example, Hasbro recently came out with a game that had the theme of Super Mario Bros. This increased the value of Monopoly. Mashable.com also included that it was sold for two dollars back in the day, but in stores it is sold for around $18. It has been translated into more than 47 languages to be played world-wide and marketers introduced the second die in 2008. With technology on the rise as well, Monopoly has been transformed into the media which has raised the value more and more. It is interesting to see that this world-wide success was at first denied only to become so successful; as William Hickson once said, “If at first you don’t succeed, try again.”
Photo courtesy of Amazon
Lyon Life 