The New Game of Cash

This is an interesting game. It uses a squared board for play, and involves moving a square of card around the board. Holes punched into the square reveal the designs on the squares of the board below. The idea is to use the card square to reveal coins (which are then matched by examples from the pot) with the intention of arriving at pre-determined sums.

The winner is the individual who achieves his or her sum correctly. The values are, of course, in pounds, shillings and pence, and the coins are made from card printed in gold and silver to represent the correct look of the original coinage. They imitate guineas and shillings of Edward VII, and are dated to 1905, suggesting 1905 for the initial production date of the game.

The style of it suggests that it might have been issued by either Ordish or, perhaps more likely, Woolley. It may or may not have a link to the Roberts brothers, but it is a very interesting game of precisely the type that they would have developed.

Zoological Lotto

This is a difficult game to identify. It may have been made by Chad Valley in the late 1890s, but images of their game of this name are not easily found.
On the other hand, there is a sense about this box that suggests it may have been a product of either Woolley and Co., or Ordish, both of whom have connections with Roberts Brothers.
If anyone can shed light on this, I shall be interested to hear. This example has only the playing cards (on which the tokens were placed) but no 'caller's cards'.

Many games manufactured by Roberts Brothers (and indeed by other makers) were loosely based on hunting or other forms of shooting. The Bird-Shooting Game was produced between the two world wars. It was a simple target-shooting game in which the participants used basic guns to fire missiles at flip-over targets.
It was provided in different versions, suited to a range of pockets. The example shown was probably one of the more expensive options, with a spring-loaded gun firing corks and four target birds. Cheaper versions used box-lids on which most of the birds shown here were cut off and the targets inside were fewer.

Slogger and Foot-It

I recently obtained a game called Slogger. It is a game based on cricket, but has little really to do with cricket. The idea is that the players use a batsman with a sprung arm and bat to strike balls through holes in a target. The hole through which the balls pass determine the result of the 'stroke'. The game is undoubtedly by Roberts Brothers, and I believe that it dates from the late 1910s or early 1920s.
In keeping with many games of the period it is essentially the same as at least one other made by the company, Foot-it, which uses a soccer players as the projector.
The second image shows the rear of this soccer player, with the spring clearly visible.

Piladex

Piladex was patented in 1890 by Harry Owen Roberts, who then went on to found the company of Roberts Brothers with his brother John Owen Roberts.

The example shown is a version manufactured between the two world wars.

Parker Brothers in America licenced Pillow-Dex in the USA.
The company survived until 1956, when it was finally closed, but in the meantime it had become for a while one of the biggest games-makers in the world.
My intention with this blog is to show examples of games ade by Roberts Brothers and also other makers when they seem particularly interesting or attractive.