Talk:Aggravation (board game)

History?

The article has:

Aggravation is one of the many variations of the game Pachisi. It was first produced in 1970 by Minneapolis-based Lakeside Industries, a division of Leisure Dynamic. Today, it is manufactured by Parker Brothers.

To this, an IP user added:

I have an Aggravation game dated 1962 published by CO-5 Company Benton Harbor Michigan, Lakeside was a copier not an innovator.

I've reverted that, but will leave it here on the talk page.--Noe (talk) 07:07, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I have Aggravation from the 1960s as well. Mine is a Canadian edition printed in English and French. It states: "Copyright by C0-5 COMPANY, INC., Benton Harbor, Michigan Manufactured under licence by Merchants Trading Limited, Toronto, Canada". It has no dates on the box or the included instruction sheet. However, it claims US Patent #3166325. Checking that patent at USPTO gives this as the start of the patent claim: "3,166,325 GAME APPARATUS HAVING PLAYING BOARD WITH MARBLE RECEIVING HOLES AND DICE RECEIVING OPENINGS Harry W. First, Benton Harbor, Mich., assignor to Co-5 Company, Inc., Benton Harbor, Mich., a corporation of Michigan Filed Apr.20, 1962, Ser. No. 189,129..." The patent appears to have been accepted on Jan 19, 1965 (ie: nearly 3 years from filing to actual patent).

Also of note is that my instructions clearly state that the game is for 2-4 players, and if you look at the game there is no way I can think of to play with 2-6 players (as claimed in this Wiki article). Unless someone could show me the same game with different instruction sheet showing how 6 players could play on this 4 player board I assume that must be a typo, perhaps copied from elsewhere (I see that boardgamegeek.com also claims 2-6 players).

The stylized "Aggravation" name printed on the box and on the instruction sheet shows (R) for registered trademark, which I believe was registered by Co-5 Company with the USPTO in the 1960s. DRead (talk) 07:55, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

This is an accurate history of the Aggravation game. Ralph Heald born; 8-29-1889 died; 1-13-1967 Made board games during the 1930’s for himself and family members. They acquired the marbles in boxes of cereal and other products that included freebies in the packaging.

Our family believes that the board game was brought to America in the 1600’s when our ancestor, William Heald Jr., immigrated from England. Also, certain family members continued to make the board for their own families. My Great great Uncle Ralph Heald started making the boards for his extended family, in the 1930’s. My mother, Doris (Dee) Martin Jensen Radsliff Krause, acquired a board as a wedding gift in 1956, while visiting her Great Uncle Ralph, with her new husband, Wally Radsliff. Years later, Ralph Heald gave a board to Doris’s daughter, Catherine Jensen Radsliff White. Both boards were made by Ralph Heald in the 1940’s. One of Catherine's, brothers, inherited their mother's board when she died.

The Aggravation game was patented by a family “friend” in the 1960’s and has become a well known and beloved game to thousands of families in America. Uncle Ralph never received any royalties from the commercialization of the game and never seemed to harbor any animosity, either. There were many in the family who did, though, including myself.

By Catherine White; a great great niece of Ralph Heald.

Aggravation was patented by my grandparents in the early '60s. They sold it to Lakeside. I'll try to get information on it. Briyun6545 (talk) 18:16, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I think it's really hard to tell who deserves honours for inventing what, as there are so many types of pachisi games. I would bet that at least the name Aggravation was heavily influenced by Mensch ärgere dich nicht. If you want to make a claim as to who invented what, I think you have to be very detailed in how rules differ from older games or how many players can play, or how long the track is. --BjKa (talk) 16:38, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

BjKa, I agree. There are so many types of pachisi games out there, and they're quite old and easy to make from wood. So many different people could have versions handed down by their grandparents. Samton748 (talk) 18:13, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

A board game eventually sold as "Aggravation" may have been patented in the 1960's but patents do not generally have names attached and so which one was "Aggravation" would be difficult to locate without a lot of research or ideally a patent number. Search for "aggravation" in the patents section at the USPTO and you will not find it. Search for "board game" and you will find many, including lots of other games. Search for a non-trademarkable word such as "pachisi" though and you may get closer (though in that case you are relying on the patent filer to say something like "my new game is a little bit like pachisi, but better because of these innovations...". If someone could locate the exact record that would be a very good thing but unless you have a patent number you will likely be sifting through many hundreds of "board game" patents at the USPTO (assuming that is where the claim was filed). I have seen dozens of board games filed at the USPTO that are pachisi-like, including some that resemble "Aggravation" to various degrees (or perhaps it is better to state that they resemble pachisi or other similar older "chase around the board" games) at the USPTO dating back to the late 1900s. I suspect there may even be several hundred similar games in total based on various searches and following links (patents often refer to older patents and many of these games refer to older games that look very similar). What makes this more difficult is that old records often do not have their entire text scanned in and are only available as images, making searches difficult.

The claim to the trademark "Aggravation" is another thing to check and perhaps add to this article. For this there are clear records going back to 1959 as you can search for "aggravation" there: http://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/index.jsp

Only two are "live" and both currently belong to Hasbro Inc. Example (partial record from USPTO):

Word Mark: AGGRAVATION

Goods and Services: IC 028. US 022 023 038 050. G & S: equipment sold as a unit for playing a board game. FIRST USE: 19590107. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19590107

Mark Drawing Code: (1) TYPED DRAWING

--DRead (talk) 22:50, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

My grandfather Rudy Malchar got the patent for the game Aggrivation under the company name BERL Industries in the 1950's. He along with another couple and my grandmother, Lois Elaine Malchar formed the company. They are the R and L in BERL. They sold the game and it was ultimately purchased by Milton Bradley. Our family collected royalties on the game into the late 1970's. I do not know who the other couple was. The uniqueness of this particular game was the shortcut in the middle. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Monahogan (talk • contribs) 04:12, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Re: number of players. There was a version of the board with six "arms" 60 degrees apart, instead of the four-armed 90 degree board pictured. This, of course, allowed for up to 6 players. Wschart (talk) 12:51, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

Unique Features

The article states that "Its distinctive features are":

• track that accommodates six players

This can also be found in Mensch ärgere dich nicht, although I couldn't ascertain on the fly whether this variant was already present in 1914 or may have been added after 196x. Anyhow it is no more a unique feature now.

• that it incorporates "shortcuts."

Also present in several other variants. No more unique. Also can't say when this was invented.

• There are no "safe" holes where a player's marbles cannot be captured

Same in Mensch ärgere dich nicht of 1914.

I suggest that the claim should at least be "Its distinctive features at the time it was invented were...", but these claims also need proof first. --BjKa (talk) 16:38, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Publisher

The article said that Parker Brothers used to make this game in the past and that Hasbro makes it in the present. But Parker Brothers is a division of Hasbro. I corrected this to reflect that. Samton748 (talk) 18:42, 2 February 2021 (UTC)