Mayor Driscoll Wants A Monopoly Museum In Salem: Here's Why

SALEM, MA -- On this day -- February 6 -- in 1935, the legendary board game Monopoly was published. And locals know that one of the best-selling board games of all time got its start in Salem. That had Mayor Kim Driscoll taking to Twitter Tuesday, suggesting that Salem would be the perfect location for a Monopoly museum and "foodtainment" center.

"Let's create an interactive attraction that introduces a whole new generation to board games+use profits to help keep youth from a 'Go to Jail, Go Directly to Jail' experience," Driscoll said in a Tweet in which she also tagged Hasbro, which owns the games original publisher, Parker Brothers.

A spokesperson for Hasbro was not immediately available for comment. Patch reached out to Driscoll's chief of staff to see how serious she is about the idea.

"We’d love to have something along those lines here in Salem, something that honored the legacy of Parker Brothers, the generations of Salem residents who were employed there over the years, and its role in both our local economy and our nation’s cultural history," said Dominick Pangallo, the mayor's chief of staff. "It’s not something the City would build itself, but there’s certainly an innovative partnership to be had if Hasbro and others were interested in exploring the concept."

For a long time, Monopoly was serious business in Salem.

George, Charles, and Edward Parker formed the company in 1893 to release its first game, "Banking." But it wasn't until 1935 when it had its breakout hit that saved the company from the brink of bankruptcy. As Parker Brothers grew, the brothers built a 35,000-square-foot facility at 190 Bridge Street. That facility eventually expanded to cover 15 acres and employed 500 workers.

Then came the Great Depression and a slump in business. On February 6, 1935, Parker Brothers released Monopoly in a last-ditch effort to save the company. The game had been around in various forms since 1903, when anti-monopolist Elizabeth Magie created a game through which she hoped to be able to explain the single tax theory of Henry George, but the Parker Brothers were the first to license it and produce the game on a large scale.

The game was an instant hit with Americans dreaming of a way out of the poverty, and by the end of the Depression the factory on Bridge Street was turning out 20,000 game sets a week. The factory was still making games -- including other popular Parker Brothers titles like Trivial Pursuit, Risk and Sorry! right up until 1991, when Hasbro bought the company and moved production to the Milton Bradley plant in Springfield.

During World War II, modified versions of the game were sent to Allied POWs. The game sets included hidden maps, currency and compasses that are credited with helping thousands escape Nazi captivity.

Another Salem connection in American board gaming history: Parker Brothers bought the rights to a British board game and renamed it Clue. The move was inspired by the 1830 death of Superior Court Justice Isaac Parker on the eve of the murder trial of Joseph White in Salem. Parker had boasted just days before he died that he was in perfect health and never missed a day on the bench.

Parker was an ancestor of the Parker brothers. They based the game board for Clue on the Salem mansion where Isaac Parker died under circumstances that suggested to some people he was murdered. They also kept the Mrs. White character from the British version of the game in homage to the defendant in the case Isaac Parker never got to hear.

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Patch file photo.

Dave Copeland can be reached at dave.copeland@patch.com or by calling 617-433-7851. Follow him on Twitter (@CopeWrites) and Facebook (/copewrites).