How old is my Monopoly Board?

June 30, 2004 4:07 AM

A couple of days ago I bought a Monopoly board from a charity shop. It's age confuses me. Anyone any ideas about it? [go to the link, do not pass go, only collect £200 if you pass half to twine42]

Okay... the board has a (c) of 1961 but the rules are (c) 1972.

The counters appear to be lead (which they weren't using in '72, surely?) but the houses and hotels are plastic. The houses are also a lot smaller than the hotels.

It's definitely a UK edition, but the money is printed on both sides, which I've not seen before.

Finally, the counters are a car, hat, boot, dog, boat and iron, but sites online suggest the iron should be a man on a horse.

Anyone got any ideas? Is this valuable or a bodge of bits from all over? It's got style, so I want to keep it, but is it to play with or to store?

posted by twine42 to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (14 answers total)

An iron is common in American sets, as are the other figures. I've never seen a set where the counters weren't metal, peuter I always imagined. And I'm used to the money being printed on both sides.

Of course the names of the streets are what distinguishes American sets from British, perhaps together with the money being pounds instead of $.
posted by Goofyy at 4:40 AM on June 30, 2004

I thought Monopoly always had double sided currency.

[checks own game]

Wuh?!!? Right, that's odd. My current game, vintage c. 1995, has single sided currency. And I have both a horse & rider and an iron. The horse and rider I do not remember from my childhood tho. Additionally, I have a barrow, a thimble and a cannon - none of which I remember days of yore. (UK'er)
posted by dash_slot- at 5:12 AM on June 30, 2004

Never seen the man on the horse, always had an iron in sets I've played with. They would have all been 1970's -mid 1980's UK sets. (I can't help but observe that a smack in the mouth with a real iron might have been the only thing to have made my cheating, swindling sister a bit more honest).

As a secondary monopoly question, are there any games which MeFites have found to be more divisive of families than Monopoly?
posted by biffa at 5:29 AM on June 30, 2004

Dash- I've never seen double sided monopoly currency. It was something I noticed when I first played about 30 years ago
posted by filmgeek at 5:43 AM on June 30, 2004

An iron is common in UK editions, but I have played no UK edition with a man on a horse.
posted by nthdegx at 5:54 AM on June 30, 2004

I'm fairly certain this page will answer any identification question you have about your Monopoly game. Looks like the 1972 edition has the double-sided money but the tokens that year were "golden." I'd almost be willing to bet you have an older set with newer rules/box?
posted by jessamyn at 6:23 AM on June 30, 2004

Sounds to me like someone put together a full Monopoly game from the remainder of a bunch of incomplete games, being that you bought it from a charity shop.
posted by mischief at 6:56 AM on June 30, 2004 [1 favorite]

I think mischief's on the money.

FWIW, my childhood Monopoly set (from the early 80's, I think, maybe late 70's) had the iron and man-on-horse, all metal tokens, and single-sided currency.
posted by mkultra at 7:15 AM on June 30, 2004

biffa: no, it is the most explosive of games. It is banned in my sister's house - where we used to have a game every christmas - because it regularly caused what we cutely called World War III.

Look, I just wanted to clarify whether we were playing the printed set of rules /or/ 'family rules'. That's all. No need to go off on one, Maurice, ya little twerp... oh, sorry, forgetting myself there...
posted by dash_slot- at 7:51 AM on June 30, 2004

'family rules'

*shudder*

But I have to say that hearts can be as bad for family harmony. Don't laugh until you've dumped the queen of spades on your kid brother after shooting the moon twice in a row.
posted by languagehat at 7:58 AM on June 30, 2004

Biffa: Risk. I've seen many games come perilously close to ending in violence. Which is probably why I've never played it.
posted by amarynth at 8:28 AM on June 30, 2004

Monopoly? Risk?

Pshaw.

You want to cause a fistfight, try playing UNO. Nothing will bring things to an ugly boil faster than piling three or four consecutive "draw four" cards onto a player who just barely called out "UNO!"
posted by mr_crash_davis at 10:30 AM on June 30, 2004

"The horse and rider I do not remember from my childhood tho. Additionally, I have a barrow, a thimble and a cannon - none of which I remember days of yore. (UK'er)."

Maybe they are from a US board, as I have my mom's counters.
Think the man on horse replaced the cannon, anyone mention a steam ship?
posted by thomcatspike at 4:51 PM on June 30, 2004

I think when twine42 said boat that he actually meant steam ship, as that is what is in the UK version (or was anyway).
posted by biffa at 1:57 AM on July 1, 2004