Hotelling enjoyed playing Monopoly with his family, with students, and even alone at night before succumbing to sleep. A gifted statistician, outstanding economist and devotee of Georgism, Hotelling went on to become the thesis advisor of two Nobel Prize winners. We can only guess at how many young minds of Princeton and Columbia might have experienced this new rhetoric of numerals, but we know for sure that one of them was Harold Hotelling. This game made tangible comparisons between capitalism and Georgism, using the material forms of wealth, banknotes and assets. Magie’s game bore many names on its journey to becoming the now-familiar Monopoly.
As the game spread along the East Coast, activists and fans copied the model and passed on the rules by word of mouth, playing in university dorms, parks, smoking rooms and even in the lecture hall. Although Magie’s game did not sell well and was poorly promoted, it was met with avid acclaim from those who shared her Georgist ideals. The book tells how Magie was never able to enjoy the rewards of her ingenious creation and how her name was lost to the annals for decades. The Landlord’s Game was the brainchild of the much-unsung Georgist activist and feminist Elizabeth Magie, whose story is chronicled in The Monopolists by American journalist and author Mary Pilon.
Wikimedia Elizabeth Magie: social justice pioneer Henry George, whose writings and advocacy formed the basis for Georgism.
