One of the most popular word games of all time, Scrabble has established itself as a cultural phenomenon that is loved by players of all ages following its initial mass production in the late-1940s. Initially invented as a passion project of Alfred Mosher Butts, the game was developed to feature a simple and competitive word-building concept that can be enjoyed by players again and again.
Scrabble timeline
Over the course of its history, the Scrabble brand has been owned by numerous companies that have had a great impact on its growth. Due to this, changes to its design and rulebook have been commonplace, even though the core of its gameplay has stayed the same since its official release.
Early 1930s: In 1931, Alfred Mosher Butts wrote a study describing three different categories of games (board games, number games and letter games) or games that combine elements of multiple categories. Although he realized that board games and number games were generally more popular, he found Anagrams to be the most popular letter game.
Around this time Butts stumbled upon English letter distribution when reading “The Gold-Bug” by Edgar Allan Poe, sparking the idea that Anagrams could be improved if its letter distributions more carefully reflected the English language. Acting on this idea, he analyzed letter frequencies in printed works, such as newspapers, to come up with an ideal letter distribution.
After making some more changes to the game, he decided to call his new project Lexiko (derived from the Greek word lexicos, which relates to words). However, Lexiko was rejected by large game manufacturers such as Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers and although Butts was able to sell some copies of the game by himself, he was not able to recoup his outlay.
Late 1930s: During this time, it was common for his neighbors and other friends to visit his house to play the game, especially on Sundays. Although these games were played in a casual setting, over time gave him ideas on ways to improve the game which he could implement.
One of the key things Butts was looking for from his game is that it would require players to demonstrate both chance and skill. To do this, he combined different elements from crossword puzzles and anagrams and added the now famous 15×15 game board.
Butts decided to file a patent for his game in 1938, changing the name of Lexiko to Criss-Crosswords (after briefly considering calling the game It). Despite his best efforts, his patent application was rejected twice and he struggled to find a potential corporate sponsor.
1947 – 1948: Having played the game extensively with his wife, fellow New Yorker James Brunot made the decision to contact Butts about the opportunity to mass-produce his board game. This also happened to be great timing for Butts, who was happy to begin passing it on to somebody else.
Together, Brunot and Butts came up with a new name, Scrabble (a relatable real word which means to use one’s fingers to find, collect, or hold on to something). Brunot also decided to redesign and market the game, introducing the iconic color scheme and devising the 50-point bonus for using all seven tiles in a word.
James Brunot officially purchased the game’s manufacturing rights in 1948, while accepting to grant Butts a royalty on each unit sold.
1952: Jack Straus, who was the president of Macy’s department store, plays Scrabble on holiday and upon his return decides to place a huge order for Scrabble sets as they were not yet available in his store. Following the demand, Brunot’s assembly line produced over 2,000 sets weekly from the Scrabble’s first manufacturing plant, which was previously an abandoned schoolhouse in rural Dodgington, Connecticut.
However, Brunot soon found he was unable to meet the increased demand for the board game and chose to pass the manufacturing over to Selchow & Righter, who had previously rejected the game. Brunot would receive royalties under the new agreement. Upon taking over manufacturing, the company’s President, Harriet T. Righter, famously remarked that Scrabble was a “nice little game” that would “sell well in bookstores”.
1953: Under the first year of being manufactured by Selchow & Righter, Scrabble achieves a milestone of 1 million sets sold.
1954: Almost 4 million sets were sold during Scrabble’s second year of manufacturing by Selchow & Righter. At the time, this quadrupled Scrabble’s all time sales.
1955: The rights to manufacture and sell the game in markets outside of North America (including the UK and Australia) were acquired by JW Spear.
1972: Scrabble’s exclusive manufacturing trademark for the US and Canada were sold to Selchow & Righter. As part of the agreement, Brunot received $1.5 million while Butts received $265,000. This allowed Selchow & Righter to move from being licensees to being full owners of the game, which gave them financial benefits and much greater control over the brand.
1984: NBC launches Scrabble as a daytime game show version of the popular board game. The first run of the show lasted until 1990 and a second run was aired during the first half of 1993.
1986: Coleco purchases Selchow & Righter, gaining rights to Scrabble in the US and Canada.
1987: The Association of British Scrabble Players is formed. The goal of the association is to oversee competitive Scrabble play in the UK.
1989: After Coleco is declared bankrupt in 1988, Hasbro purchases its assets and gains the rights to manufacture Scrabble in the US and Canada.
1994: Mattel acquires JW Spear, gaining their manufacturing rights in markets outside of North America.
1994: Hasbro faced controversy when they proposed removing around 200 words from the official Scrabble dictionary due to their offensive nature. Hasbro later decided to publish two dictionaries (one for recreational play and the other for tournaments) with varying word counts, including “questionable” terms.
2003: The World English-Language Scrabble Players’ Association (WESPA) is formed, although it was formally constituted 2 years later. WESPA was created to represent the interests of Scrabble’s national bodies and competitors around the world.
2004: Scrabble is inducted into the United States’ National Toy Hall of Fame.
2009: The North American Scrabble Players Association (now known as NASPA Games) is founded. Its role is to formally administer North American competitive Scrabble clubs and tournaments.
2012: The highest ever score in a Scrabble tournament, 850 points, is officially achieved by Toh Weibin in a game against Mark Landsberg. The score was recorded and recognized by Guinness World Records.
2017: Scrabble GO is released as the official Scrabble mobile game for iOS and Android, featuring special game modes.
2019: Already known as the greatest Scrabble player of all time because of his game strategy, Nigel Richards from New Zealand becomes the only ever player to win five World Scrabble Championships. This tournament was seen as the most prestigious international Scrabble tournament in the world at the time.
2022: Nigel Richards also becomes the first ever player to win two WESPA Championships. The tournament, created in 2015 and hosted on a biennial basis, replaced the World Scrabble Championships as the biggest Scrabble tournament on the global stage.
2023: Scrabble is one of the most popular word games of all time, with over 150 million sets of the games being sold worldwide. The game is played in over 120 countries and translated in more than 30 languages.
Biography of Alfred Mosher Butts
Alfred Mosher Butts took great influence from Anagrams and other popular games of his era before coming up with the idea behind Scrabble. Although he was the brains behind its success, he did not become extremely wealthy due to his invention and his reputation still remains relatively unknown by many people around the world.
- Alfred Mosher Butts was born in Poughkeepsie, New York, on April 13th 1899.
- He attended school in the same area, before later attending the University of Pennsylvania in order to study the field of architecture.
- Following his studies, he worked in New York City as an architect and made contributions to various projects throughout the 1920s and 1930s.
- Seeing his friends and family suffering through hard economic times during the Great Depression, Butts decided to work on a game that would bring people entertainment.
- After several variations, Butts partnered with James Brunot to eventually release Scrabble in 1948.
- Even though Scrabble’s sales began slowly, its popularity only began to really surge during the 1950s and 1960s.
- Furthermore, despite receiving widespread recognition for inventing Scrabble, he did not achieve great financial success until many years after its release.
- Eventually Scrabble has grown to become one of the most loved and recognizable board games all over the world, even regularly played by influential world leaders and celebrity figures.
- Following his success with the game, he was known to live a relatively understated lifestyle from modest sales royalties and he still continued to play the game occasionally with his friends and family.
- Butts passed away at the age of 94 on April 4th, 1993. In honor of his achievement, in 1995 a street sign was placed at the corner of 35th Avenue and 81st Street in Queens which recognized Scrabble’s birthplace (removed in 2008 but reinstated 2011).
What is the origin of the word Scrabble?
- Before being named Scrabble, the game was named Lexiko and slightly later in time, Criss-Cross Words.
- However, upon Alfred Mosher Butts’ decision to collaborate with James Brunot, the entrepreneur who would later purchase the game’s rights, they decided to come up with a new name for marketing reasons.
- Eventually they settled on the name Scrabble, a real word which has a relatable meaning to the gameplay itself (defined as to find, collect or hold on to something using one’s fingers).