KING'S MEN... Made by Parker Brothers, 1937, and invented by ELIZABETH MAGIE PHILLIPS. The importance of this game is that it is one of a few that was created by Elizabeth Magie Phillips...

A little bit like CAMELOT and CHINESE CHECKERS, the object of this simple game is to reduce your 14 tokens to 2, by jumping your opponents tokens or forming rows of 3 tokens. The playing pieces are small wooden circular pawns with pins in the bottom that go into the holes on the board.

Elizabeth Magie Phillips' status in game history is assured by the fact that she invented the game that eventually became MONOPOLY. Although popular understanding was that Charles Darrow had invented the game, subsequent investigation resulting from a lawsuit involving the game ANTI-MONOPOLY in the 1980's, revealed that Elizabeth was the true author of MONOPOLY, having created THE LANDLORD'S GAME in 1904, re-releasing it in the 1920's, and finally, after Parker Brothers secured the patent from her, a version in 1939 (above).

She had sold MOCK TRIAL to Parker Brothers previously, so there was a relationship there, but the general feeling is that BARGAIN DAY and KING'S MEN were released as consolation prizes, as she had no claim to the riches that MONOPOLY generated once she sold the patents... THE LANDLORD'S GAME, upon which MONOPOLY is based, was released in 1939 strictly to secure copyright. While Darrow became a millionaire, and Parker Brothers went on to sell over 100,000,000 copies of MONOPOLY, she got nothing. Subsequently, she and her limited released games are virtually forgotten, except by collectors. Value: $100 - $200