While Tiddledy-Winks began as an adult craze in 1889 and 1890 in the UK and USA, the game quickly evolved to appeal mostly to children.
Game publishers incorporated animals in game illustrations on the covers, targets, and sometime aprons of the games to make them more appealing to children.
Amphibians on Tiddlywinks Games
The earliest known tiddlywinks game showing an animal on the cover illustration is the iconic McLoughlin Bros.’ IMPROVED GAME TIDDLEDY WINKS, patent pending, introduced in 1890. A frog appears on the cover smoking a pipe and holding a fishing pole. The cover was updated to replace PATENT PENDING with Patented Nov. 18 1890 when a patent was granted to Charles N. Hoyt, a bookkeeper from Brooklyn, New York.
Mammals on Tiddlywinks Games
Dogs are particularly popular subjects portrayed on tiddlywinks cover artwork.
BOW-O-WINK TIDDLEDY WINKS shows 3 dogs on the cover as if they were in a dog show. The same illustration is shown on the game target, with the dog’s mouths cut out. The aim of the game is to shoot winks through the dogs’ mouths to garner 10 or 15 points per successful shot. This game was published by the E.E. Fairchild Co. under their All-Fair brand when they were located in Churchville, New York. It bears a 1931 copyright.
Parker Brothers Inc. produced Playmates TIDDLEDY WINKS with a dog and a girl rolling a hoop plus a boy carrying books and skates amidst leaves on the game cover. This game first appeared in the 1938–1939 Parker Brothers trade catalog, selling for 50 cents and including a “heavy glass cup considered by many to be best for use with Tiddledy Winks”.
Cats are also quite often seen in the illustrations on tiddlywinks games.
Milton Bradley Co. came out with two varieties of Black Cat Tiddledy Winks. The only differences between the two varieties are the size of the box and the publisher catalog number shown on them: one is 4629, and the other, 4404. Oh, and by the way, Milton Bradley catalog numbers aren’t helpful in determining the dates when their games were published; in fact, the company very often reused catalog numbers, most of which started with a 4. These Black Cat Tiddledy Winks games were first sold in 1912.
The GAME OF TIDDLEDY WINKS, noted to include EXTRA FINE EDITION “IVORY” WINKS. (though most likely to have vegetable ivory winks rather than true sea mammal ivory winks) shows three cats (wearing clothes) on the cover hunching over a table playing tiddlywinks. Milton Bradley Co. produced this game, with publisher catalog number 4400. This game appears in a 1927 Milton Bradley trade catalog at a price of $1.00, though it is possible that it was available prior to that time. This is a tiddlywinks bowling game since it includes ten wooden pins to be knocked over as targets.
Spear’s Games (originally John W. Spear & Sons) of London produced several varieties of tiddlywinks games featuring kittens. Three Little Kittens • THE NEW TIDLEY WINK GAME (with no publication catalog number noted on the game) shares the same illustration of three alert kittens sitting next to each other, each wearing ribbons around their necks, with another Spear game, LITTLE KITTENS TIDLEY WINKS GAME, which is marked with publisher catalog number 5076/1.
A third game shares the fonts and colors of its title with the latter, and is called LITTLE KITTENS TIDLEY-WINK GAME (just adding the hyphen) with a less detailed illustration depicting two cats resting with another one cat playing with a green ball. This game is also marked with publisher catalog number 5076/1.
The rules for each of these three games say it is “The new Flipping Game played with bone counters”. Each of the games was made in Bavaria.
Spear Game Archives records derived from their trade catalogs list games with these names as from either 1911 or 1930. Given that these games were made in Bavaria, and that the onset of World War I resulted in British companies dropping importation of products from Germany, these games are most likely from around 1911..
Milton Bradley Company produced the game of TIDDLEDY WINKS, with publisher catalog number 4547, showing two monkeys wearing vests on the cover shooting winks into a half coconut target.
Parker Brothers Inc. debuted TINKLE BELL TIDDLEDY WINKS (publisher catalog number 49) in their 1927 Parker Games trade catalog, selling for 60 cents. The game continued to be shown regularly in most of their trade catalogs, with some minor variations in appearance, up to 1935 and then, with a gap, finally in 1942. During World War II, Parker Brothers severely cut back on its offerings of games. This game portrayed a bear, a rabbit, an owl, and a white mouse on its cover, all in harmony listening to a pan figure playing a four-toned flute while leaning against a tree.
The company Playtime House in Rochester, New York produced BIG GAME HUNT TIDDLY WINKS. This game was copyrighted in 1945. Its cover shows a tiger and a lion.
In the Animal TIDDLEY TARGET Game, the objective is shoot winks to knock over standing cardboard targets balanced on a fence that depict animals, including: a lion, squirrel, elephant, monkey, bird, owl, chipmunk, and duck, each dressed in clothes. The game was produced by the Vitaplay Toy Company of New York City and sold in stores in 1944 for $1.00. The game was designed by Arthur Dritz, who also designed games for American Toy Works of New York and the National Game Company of West Springfield, Massachusetts.
TIDDLEDY Winks was published by Milton Bradley Company in 1939. H. Boylston Dummer (1878–1945) was the illustrator of the game cover, which shows a cow and a horse skating together along with a raccoon pulling a sleigh across the ice with two more raccoons inside. Dummer illustrated other Milton Bradley games and puzzles, including a raccoon, pig, fox, and horse in a boat and canoe for 4 Picture Puzzles for Children in 1938, and A Game of Friendly Fun board game in 1939 that depicts a baseball game played by a dog, pig, fox, cow, rooster, squirrel, opossum (maybe), horse, rabbit, and raccoon. He was also responsible for The JOLLY ANIMAL PICNIC GAME, showing a fox, raccoon, rooster, 3 squirrels, bear, rabbit, pig, and horse picnicking. In addition, he illustrated The ANIMAL BALL GAME with animals playing American football on the cover.
Thanks to Damaris Rodriguez for sending a message on 1 July 2023 with corrections to several animals identified in this TIDDLEDY Winks game.
The prolific Parker Brothers Inc. published ELEPHANT TIDDLEDY WINKS. Newspaper ads for this game first appeared in 1959 though the game was still available in 1964. The cover of the game depicts three elephants with tusks marching across the cover with their trunks holding onto the tails of elephants in front of them.
The cover of this Jumbo TIDDLEDY WINKS game by J. Pressman & Co., Inc. of New York City shows a smiling blue elephant sitting in a large tiddlywinks pot while holding a black wink in its trunk with a variety of winks circulating in the air around it.
On 12 July 1890, Carl Spear, a principal of the company J. W. Spear & Sons of England (and Bavaria), copyrighted the cover illustration and rules for A NEW GAME – THE NORTH POLE, a game designed in England and manufactured in Fürth, Bavaria. While the cover illustrates a polar bear on ice, the game is, of course, a tiddlywinks-style game.
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title • A New Game The North Pole
publisher • J. W. Spear & Sons
first published, copyright application date • 12 July 1890
item • game cover
photograph by • Rick Tucker
original at • National Archives, Kew, England
licenseable • per British National Archives, Kew
Milton Bradley Co. came out with this edition of TIDDLEDY WINKS under publisher catalog number 4592 during the later years of the Great Depression. Three pigs are shown walking in its subdued cover illustration; the cover of course not depicting tiddlywinks whatsoever. The pig at right appears to be wearing a navy cap. The same illustration was used on at least one other Milton Bradley product, the dexterity puzzle Pigs in the Clover, which sold for 25 cents in the 1936–1937 Milton Bradley catalog.
Reptiles on Tiddlywinks Games
THE MERRY GAME OF JUMPING TURTLES AND THE TURTLES OBSTACLE RACE sports an 1899 copyright and patent (plus a trademark) and was produced by Parker Brothers. The turtle figures are flicked into the air using a stick wand squidger, with the objective of sailing the turtles over the vertical folded target.
This game was patented on 3 January 1899 by Charles E. Gibbs of Malden, Massachusetts.
Birds on Tiddlywinks Games
A kingfisher bird snaps winks with one of its claws towards a frog with its mouth open and several winks inside it on the cover of TIDDLEY WINKS by A. Collier of London, England. The game indicates that it has a REGISTERED TRADE MARK although it isn’t at all clear what name was trademarked, since Joseph A. Fincher’s original 1890 trademark for TIDDLEDY-WINKS had long lapsed. Collier’s other games were made between 1890 and 1905. The use of TIDDLEY WINKS on this game is one of the earliest for this spelling of the game’s name.
In the game IN AND OUT THE WINDOW made by Samuel Gabriel Sons & Company, the winks are in the shape of swallow birds. The aim of the game is to shoot the swallow winks through the open windows of a barn. The game sold for 65 cents in 1942. From the rules:
The object of the game is for each player to dispose of his own swallows and any which opponents shoot into his space. When he has no swallows left, he wins the game. He should announce this by shouting "Out."
There are no turns in this game, but at a given signal the everybody starts shooting and continues as fast as he can until one player wins.
The Wilder Manufacturing Company of St. Louis, Missouri published several varieties of a tiddlywinks game showing a stork on the cover holding babies in a bag with an elf on a ladder adding a baby to the bag. Storks have long been depicted as delivering babies.
One variety of this game is called STORK TIDDLEDY WINKS GAME, with a publisher catalog number of 160, marked COPYRIGHTED, and sporting Wilder’s YLDR on an eagle logo. Only the cover of this game depicts a stork and babies; the equipment inside is rather generic.
The other variety is called TIDDLEDY WINKS GAME, with the same YLDR on an eagle logo and publisher catalog number 75. Yet another variety has the same title but a different logo, YLDR on a diamond without an eagle, plus publisher catalog number 57.
These games are estimated to be from the 1920s or 1930s.
Invertebrates on Tiddlywinks Games
Crickets adorn the cover of CRICKETS IN THE GRASS made by the Madmar Quality Company of 117 North Genesee Street in Utica, New York. In this game, a player uses the bottom of a small aluminum cup as a squidger to flick a small wooden stick up into the air and then catch the stick inside the metal cup. The game appears in Madmar’s 1925 trade catalog and was produced in two varieties. The game with publisher catalog number 122 contained equipment for 2 players and cost $3.00 per dozen, while No. 124 permitted 4 to play and cost $6.00 a dozen.
The Tiddledy Winks Croquet game by Zulu Toy Manufacturing Co., Inc. of Battle Creek, Michigan, depicts four pixies on its cover in addition to a grasshopper and beetle looking on.
publisher • Zulu Toy Mfg. Co. Inc. (Battle Creek, Michigan)
title • Tiddledy Winks Croquet
date • © 1926publisher catalog number • 220licensable
Chad Valley Games of Harborne, England produced two known varieties of THE “CHAD VALLEY” GAME OF HOVERMOTH, which features a target of metal-weighted cardboard moths balanced atop metal poles that fit into holes in the cardboard base inside the box bottom. The object of this game is to shoot a wink to knock each moth off its perch on a metal pole or on an elevated string.
Two slightly different versions of HOVERMOTH are known. The version shown here depicts a scene in the box bottom showing trees in a field and houses in the background, and the box cover has a red underlabel (the label under the main cover artwork label). This version comes in a larger box, measuring 20 1/2″ wide by 13 1/4 high by 1″ deep.
The other version shows a water coastline at sunset with a lighthouse, and has a blue underlabel. This version has a small box, measuring 13 1/2″ wide by 10″ high by 3/4″ deep.
Hovermoth appears for sale in a 10 January 1936 newspaper advertisement by A. Byrd & Sons in Shepton Mallet, England. Hovermoth was still available per an article in the 4 December 1942 West Sussex County Times.
