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VINTAGRAPH • WPA • WWII • YOU MEAN A WOMAN CAN OPEN IT?

Monopoly: 1954

Bert and Iva's daughter Helen is home to Wausau, Wisconsin, from California with the new baby. While Baby sleeps, the grandparents and parents play a lively game of Monopoly. Kodachrome from the Bert's Slides Collection. View full size.

Bert and Iva's daughter Helen is home to Wausau, Wisconsin, from California with the new baby. While Baby sleeps, the grandparents and parents play a lively game of Monopoly. Kodachrome from the Bert's Slides Collection. View full size.

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History of Monopoly tokens or pieces

The first game tokens produced by Parker Bros. were metal and included the iron, cannon, thimble, ship, hat, and shoe. That was in 1935 and in 1936 demand was so high that wooden pieces were made also. During World War II only wood tokens were made because of metal for war demands. Metal tokens were included in the sets again after the war. I remember playing with neighbor friends in 1951 and 1952 only with the six pieces listed above.

Re: Player Pieces

We had the same set, also a 50s vintage with the wooden ones. Sometime in the mid 50s my older brother saw an ad in the back of a comic book (probably near Charles Atlas) for the replacement metal set with the boot, car, iron and the others. Since he had bought the pieces, the car became his personal property and no one else was allowed to use it.

It's a set from 1950's

We actually inherited the set when Iva, second from right, passed away a few years ago at 102. Wooden pieces, and the board doesn't fit into the box. The pieces, money and cards fit into a smaller box and the board is outside.

It seems this was a popular game in the house as there are several images of them playing the Monopoly with various visitors.

[That's how it is with our vintage set in my photo below; board loose, small sectioned box for the items. -tterrace

Re: Comfortable in the early '50s

Yeah, they were comfortable and relaxed. They didn't have their jackets on. Jeans were worn by workmen. Sweats? only for athletes or the gym, which these folks would never have gone to. Men might have stripped down to their undershirts when working in the garden or at the beach, but they usually wore trousers, not shorts.

Monopoly and Clue pieces

Everyone wanted the Go-Cart. If I couldn't get the go cart, I would use the revolver from the Clue game. Too bad one couldn't use the Monopoly pieces in the Clue game. "I think Colonel Mustard did it, he did it with the iron, and he did it in the Conservatory that overlooked Ventnor Avenue. Can you prove me wrong?"

We would spice up Monopoly by putting a five hundred dollar bill in the middle of the board. Also, any fines or payments through fines, taxes, Chance, or Community Chest would go there, too. If one landed on Free Parking, the player won the "pot."

Was this ever really considered comfortable?

Not that I'm all THAT young (60), but when men were sitting around back in the day playing board games and wearing suits & ties or slacks, did they believe they were comfortably "hanging out", or did they feel stuffy and confined? (C'mon, there must be a few octogenarians on the board here who can honestly answer that for me.)

"Bank error in your favor"

Tterrace-Thanks for the picture of your set. I thought maybe your brother "traded" your metal figurines for wooden Parchesi pieces.

Re: Wartime vintage?

Our family set, purchased in the early sixties, had wooden player pieces in the exact shapes and colours as the Wisconsin home and tterrace's, but our hotels and houses were, by then, made of plastic. No metal anywhere.

Hope That Cigarette....

doesn't fall out of the ashtray; otherwise, the "bank", as well as the chair it is sitting on, may catch fire....

And by the way.... is the guy on the right attempting to get the "Get Out Of Jail Free" card he hid up his sleeve earlier?

I also still have by old Monopoly set; yep - wooden tokens, wooden hotels, wooden houses - vintage stuff never dies!

Wartime vintage?

According to this site, Monopoly has almost always had metal game pieces. The first year, it had no pieces - you were supposed to use items from around the house. Metal pieces were included once Parker Bros. began publishing the game in 1935. Monopoly used wooden pieces during WWII, but went back to the metal pieces postwar.

So, either this is a version sold during WWII or, like our set growing up, they lost the pieces.

[They're an exact match to those in our set from this period. -tterrace

Where's the boot?

And thimble, iron, and other players pieces? Looks like wooden game pieces that aren't the regular metal iconic pieces.

[Player pieces in sets of this vintage, like mine below, were abstract shapes and made of wood, as were the houses and hotels. -tterrace]

Monopoly then and now

The Monopoly set I grew up with in the 1950s is of similar vintage, and I still have it:

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