Milton Bradley Biography

Manufacturer, born in Vienna, Maine, USA. After various positions as a draughtsman, he became interested in lithography and introduced the first lithograph press to Springfield, MA (1860). He printed and personally sold a new parlour game, ‘The Checkered Game of Life’, which became so profitable that he formed Milton Bradley and Company (1864) to print games and game manuals. In 1869 he published the first book on kindergartens in the US, Paradise of Childhood, by the German kindergarten pioneer, Friedrich Froebel. Bradley followed up with a series of kindergarten materials, newsletters, and children's books. Interested in teaching colours, he wrote and published four books including Color in the Kindergarten (1893). In 1893 his company began publishing the Kindergarten Review which became the journal of the International Kindergarten Union. His partners retired in 1878 and he reorganized as Milton Bradley Co, which long retained its position as a leading American manufacturer of games and toys.