Category:
Games

Summer Redneck Games

Held annually in Dublin, Georgia since 1996. Events include redneck horseshoes (using toilet seats), the mud pit belly flop, armpit serenade, watermelon seed spitting, and bobbing for pig's feet. They also promise you'll see a lot of butt crack, camouflage, and four-wheel drives.

More info: Summer Redneck Games, pinterest





Posted By: Alex - Fri May 19, 2017 - Comments (2)
Category: Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, Games, Hillbillies, Country Bumpkins, Ruralism and Flyover Country

The Monopoly Killer

July 1991: While preparing to play a game of Monopoly, Marc Cienkowski and Michael Klucznik got into a fight over who would use the car playing piece. Cienkowski insisted that since they were at his house, he got to be the car -- and not the hat or thimble. But Klucznik insisted that he was going to be the car, and continued to insist this even after Cienkowski hit him in the face. So Cienkowski fetched his bow and arrow and shot Klucznik through the heart. Cienkowski later pleaded guilty to criminal homicide.

Philadelphia Daily News - Feb 7, 1992
Click to enlarge


Posted By: Alex - Wed Mar 08, 2017 - Comments (3)
Category: Crime, Games, 1990s

Long Chess Game

Munro MacLennan and Lawrence Grant began a game of chess in 1926, while students at Aberdeen University in Scotland. However, it was an unusual game because they agreed to make only one move a year. Whoever's turn it was would write their move on a postcard and send it to their opponent at Christmas.

In 1961, 35 years later, they were still playing the game, which got them a bit of media attention. They predicted they would be done with the game around 1975. However, I've haven't been able to find any report about whether they actually did finish and, if so, who won.

The Melbourne Age - Aug 8, 1961



The Melbourne Age - Jun 26, 1963

Posted By: Alex - Thu Feb 02, 2017 - Comments (3)
Category: Games

Bacteria Panic

"Never play this game with the real victims of disease."

Arizona Republic - May 3, 1991



Washington Post - May 7, 1991

Posted By: Alex - Thu May 26, 2016 - Comments (8)
Category: Games, 1990s

Miniature Grand Prix



This is what we did before video games.

Posted By: Paul - Mon May 02, 2016 - Comments (3)
Category: Games, Toys, 1960s, Cars

Careers for Girls



In 1990, Parker Brothers released a new board game called "Careers for Girls" in which players could choose from six jobs: supermom, rock star, school teacher, fashion designer, animal doctor, and college graduate.

By contrast, the career options in the non-gendered version of Careers included things such as Ecology, Teaching, Sports, Computer Science, Space, Show Biz, Big Business, and Politics. (The game was invented in 1955, and the various career options changed over the years.)

Of course, the company got slammed for being sexist and soon discontinued the "for girls" version of the game, claiming a "lack of mass appeal."

The Big Game Hunter blog offers more background on the history of the Careers game and its original inventor, James Cooke Brown (science fiction author and creator of the artificial language, Loglan).

The Southeast Missourian — Nov 26, 1990

Posted By: Alex - Wed Jan 06, 2016 - Comments (9)
Category: Games, 1990s

Uncle Wiggly vs. DONNIE DARKO Rabbit

image

image

Equally creepy? The earlier guy the inspiration for the later one?

Original ad here.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Dec 20, 2015 - Comments (7)
Category: Animals, Anthropomorphism, Games, Movies, 1920s, 2000s, Fictional Monsters

Who Can Beat Nixon?

1971 board game. I assume that whoever played Nixon was allowed to cheat.



via New York Magazine - Aug 16, 1971

Posted By: Alex - Wed Sep 16, 2015 - Comments (3)
Category: Games, Politics, 1970s

Give a Party for the Party!

A 1930s party-planning manual for members of the American Communist Party, downloadable as a PDF here. Let's just say, those guys knew how to throw a cheap party.

More info from a 2003 article in the NY Times:

Published in the late 1930s by the party's New York state branch and recently rediscovered by a Brandeis University historian, it's a 15-page illustrated tutorial in the art of ideologically correct fraternizing. Among the suggested high jinks: cutting editorials from The Daily Worker into pieces and having guests see who can put them back together fastest, or holding a mock convention on, say, nonintervention in Spain. "One guest is made chairman. Another is Chamberlain, another Leon Blum, a third Mussolini," the pamphlet cheerfully explains. Or why not try a round of anti-Fascist darts? "Draw a picture of Hitler, Mussolini, Hague or another Girdleresque pest. Put it on a piece of soft board with thumbtacks. Six throws for a nickel, and a prize if you paste Hague in the pants, or Trotsky in the eye," the pamphlet instructs.

Also, advertise "All the free beer you can drink!" but charge expensive admission at the door ("Yes, people will pay!"). And then:

Pour your beer in the center of the glass not down the inside. POURING IN THE MIDDLE GIVES MORE FOAM AND LESS LIQUID — STRETCHES EACH BARREL FURTHER.

Posted By: Alex - Thu Jul 23, 2015 - Comments (2)
Category: Games, Politics, 1930s

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Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes.

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