JW Spear & Sons
| JW Spear & Sons
|
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|---|---|
 |
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| legal form | Corporation |
| founding | 1879 |
| resolution | 1997 |
| Reason for dissolution | Liquidation after takeover |
| Seat |
Nuremberg (1879–1984) Enfield (1930–1997) |
| Branch | Game publisher |
JW Spear & Sons was a game manufacturer that had production facilities in Nuremberg until 1984 and in Enfield ( Great Britain ) until 1997 under the name "JW Spear & Sons" . His trademark was initially a lying lance with the initials JWS & S , later Spear-Spiel or Spear-Spiele and SPEAR'S GAMES , whereby the brand component "Games" was used in different languages.
Company history
Founding time
Jacob Wolf Spear (1832-1893), born Jacob Wolf Spier, who anglicized his name when he temporarily emigrated to America , founded an import and export business with haberdashery in Fürth in 1879 , which can be seen as the starting point for game manufacture. After JW Spear's sons, Raphael and Joseph, joined the company in 1884 and 1885, it traded under the name JW Spear & Sons and achieved international recognition. The eldest sons left the company, but the younger sons, Karl and Wilhelm, joined the company as partners. Even after the company's founder's suicide on September 3, 1893, due to two fatal factory fires and hostility based on some anti-Semitic grounds, together with his widow Sophie nee. Rindskopf continued the company.
Establishment of the Nuremberg location and establishment of a branch in England
In 1898 the owners moved the headquarters to Nuremberg, where production started in a new factory building (Höfener Straße 91) in May 1899 and from where the imaginatively designed and high-quality games began their triumphal march on the German and international market. After a later closed company branch in London had already existed at the end of the 19th century , a subsidiary in Great Britain was founded again in Enfield in 1930 and, after his emigration from Germany, was run by the founder's grandson, Richard Spear (1897–1983). After 1933, this step ensured the personal survival of many family members and ultimately also the entrepreneurial continuity of the company, which had become the largest German game manufacturer in the 1920s.
Forced sale of the company in 1938
At the beginning of 1938, JW Spear & Sons was still active in the export business with its games, as evidenced by a change for a delivery to a dealer in Spa in Belgium . After the persecution of the Nazi regime following the Reichspogromnacht , the Jewish owners of the German branch of the company were forced to sell the game publisher for a fraction of its value only a few months later as part of the so-called “ Aryanization ” . The buyer was Hanns Porst , the founder of the Photo Porst chain of photo shops . Not even the minimum purchase price set by the “Aryanization” appraiser was paid to the Spear family. Hermann Spear, brother Richard Spears, who remained in Germany due to official orders to process the transfer of the company and probably also due to family considerations, was deported to Auschwitz in 1943, where he was killed on July 10, 1943.
In the "Aryanized" company - as in many other German game publishers at that time - war-inciting games such as "Kurs Ost-Nordost" (1939) and " U-Boats drive against England" and " Bombs on England " (both 1940) developed. In 1939, the game “Know You Nuremberg” was also brought onto the market, and the new buildings for the Nazi party rally grounds were also marked on the game plan . Porst tried to convert from May 1940 associated with the Jewish founder of the company brand name "Spear" which he initially continued used because of its prominence in a slogan: " Sp iel e , a famous r portant" to disguise the origin of the company . The game instructions were now often drawn with the words “Your Onkel Hanns” in order to present the new company owner as a fatherly friend to the children playing.
Return of the company after the Second World War and IPO
After the Second World War , the widow Hermann Spears and Richard Spear managed to return the company, which was partly destroyed by the war, to the family property. The Nuremberg game manufacturer, which now functioned as a subsidiary of the English main company, then produced again at a considerable level, but could not regain the market importance of the time before 1933. In 1978 the company was transformed into Spear-Spiele GmbH and merged with the game manufacturer L. Kleefeld & Co. due to economic pressure . Production was stopped on December 31, 1984 at the Nuremberg location.
The English company, which had been converted into a stock corporation, went public in 1966 in order to be able to raise the necessary capital for the expansion and improvement of production and sales capacities. 1970 acquired Spear's the English company GJ Hayter & Co. from Bournemouth , the premium on the UK market jigsaw - puzzles produced (Victory Jigsaw puzzles), and produced from plywood sawn by hand puzzles to 1988th
1989 Spear took over the French game publisher Habourdin .
Takeover by Mattel
Finally, the company itself was acquired in 1994 by the American company Mattel , the world's largest company in the toy industry, which had outbid its competitor Hasbro . The Enfield production facilities were closed, but the SPEAR'S-GAMES trademark was continued.
General entertainment games, craft games and quartets
Most of the games were offered in different configurations at different prices so that they were attractive and affordable for the broadest group of buyers. In particular, due to the caesuras set by the two world wars, the game plans and the cover illustrations were revised in many games to take account of the changed public taste.
General entertainment games
Particularly popular games were e.g. B. The ladder game Up and Down , published in 1920 . Funny ladder game , which was an adaptation of the game Snakes and Ladders by the English toy manufacturer Frederick Henry Ayres from 1892 and showed circus scenes instead of snakes and ladders, the Denk Fix! (later at Jumbo and Mattel ), the magnetic fishing game or the flying hats .
Craft games
Various games such as loom , sewing school , weaving school or the legendary " Strick-Liesl " were offered for handicrafts .
Quartets
- General
Until the Aryanization in 1938 - Hanns Porst did not continue to produce new quartets, but sold stocks - a wide range of around 55 quartet games was also designed. In 1929, just under a dozen of these were taken over by the luxury card manufacturer Bernhard Dondorf . The Dondorf quartets distributed by Spear can be recognized by the initials “BD” on the back of the card. On the other hand, the Spear quartets only revealed their origins in the last few years of sale through a company imprint on the back; before that, the back of the cards had remained monochrome or had a geometric pattern.
In order to do justice to the most diverse groups of buyers, some quartets were offered in different versions, both in terms of the design of the storage box and in terms of size. So fluctuated z. B. the composer's quartet between 24 and 48 sheets and was delivered in a gift box or a sliding box. An early poet quartet designed by Friedrich Petersen even consisted of 96 cards. The games were accompanied by separate instructions, on the back of which the rest of the publisher's range of quartets was often listed. In contrast to other leading manufacturers, such as Josef Scholz (Mainz), Adolf Sala or Otto Maier (Ravensburg), Spear did not number his quartets on the packaging, although they were certainly provided with numbers in Spear's catalogs, which are in brackets below are set. This was somewhat detrimental to the quartet lovers' eagerness to collect. To this day, Spear quartets have not achieved a reputation comparable to that of other providers with numbering systems.
While the maps of the early quartets were still made using the chromolithographic process, many quartets of the 1930s had photographic images.
- Geography, Travel and Transport
Many games have been dedicated to travel and modern traffic. From 1912 to 1923 the “ Weltreise -Quartett” (No. 523) with 60 maps drawn in chromolithography was sold. Due to the changed geopolitical situation, the quartet was reduced to only 48 sheets after the First World War . A later new edition in the 1930s then showed world travel destinations on 48 photo cards.
The New Cities Quartet (No. 647) drawn by Johann Peter Werth ("JP Werth") and arranged according to landscapes came up with the unusual number of cards of 72 around 1912. It mainly shows larger towns in Germany than it had reached its greatest extent in recent times. So it still united views of Tilsit and Konigsberg in East Prussia, Glogau and Liegnitz in Silesia, or Strasbourg and Metz in Alsace-Lorraine . His imagined city route also touched the Swiss cities of Lucerne and Bern , Austria's capital Vienna as well as Prague ( Bohemia ) and Budapest ( Hungary ). A shortened edition with 48 cards printed on the back was published in the Weimar Republic . All quartets relating to foreign places, including Alsace-Lorraine and those on East and West Prussia, had disappeared.
The quartets from A to J of the game “With “ Graf Zeppelin ” around the world” were edited by Max Geisenheyner, who participated in the trip, while the box design was designed by Gustav Müller. The “Weltflug” from 1933 (48 sheets) was designed by the director of the Deutsche Luft-Reederei Walter Mackenthun and the “airplane quartet” by Lilly Hoffmann. The latter showed photographic images of aircraft types and pilots with the permission of the Reich Aviation Ministry .
That same year, Spear also introduced a quartet of advances in transportation development. The 40-sheet game showed, among others, Drais' impeller, the Montgolfière and an ocean liner ; it also appeared in French and Dutch.
- Natural sciences
Games with images of animals and plants, which were arranged according to various topics, took up a large space. The number of cards fluctuated very strongly here. Exotic animals ("Zoologie", No. 522) were presented around 1910 on 60 cards. At the beginning of the 1920s, an “animal quartet”, edited by the natural scientist Kurt Floericke and drawn by Walter Heubach, with images of domestic animals on 24 sheets, came onto the market. The well-known animal illustrator Karl von Dombrowski combined the local and exotic fauna in his "Animal Quartet" from 1934 . And from the takeover of Bernhard Dondorf, his quartet "Fauna" with 40 sheets from 1931 to 1940 was still listed with Spear. Around 1909 Spear brought out a trilingual "Flower Quartet" (No. 236) with initially 48 cards and later a "New Flower Quartet" based on watercolors by the painter Catharina Klein . It remained in the range until 1938. The pushing back of foreign languages that came with National Socialism then led to the fact that the English and French plant names were omitted in the 1930s. The number of pages in this quartet fluctuated between 24 and 48. On 60 cards with splendid Art Nouveau frames, Spears “Mineralien Quartet” (No. 521) from 1910 shows the whole range of rocks, from precious stones to semi-precious stones and silicates to rubble. In 1916 Albert Neuburger put together an inventor game consisting of 12 quartets.
- technology
Finally, technical issues were also taken up. In 1916 Albert Neuburger put together an inventor game consisting of 12 quartets.
- Sports
A sports quartet consisting of 24 cards was launched in the early 1930s. It presented selected classic sports such as athletics , water sports, motor sports and ball games, but also hunting, fishing and camping under the heading of “nature sports” .
- Music and fine arts as well as literature and fairy tales
Another focus was art, literature and music. In 1905 a Citaten Quartet, a Quartet “Masterpieces of Painting” and in 1913 a “Painter Quartet” (both by Friedrich Petersen with 60 sheets each) and an “Opera Quartet” with 48 sheets each. In silhouettes operas etc. a. illustrated by Mozart , Wagner or Lortzing . Also in 1913 a “song quartet” (No. 928) was published, which was illustrated by Andreas Untersberger (1874–1944) from Austria , and in 1926 a “poet's quartet” drawn by Franz Kuczéra.
A “fairy tale quartet” (No. 856), first drawn by JP Werth and then by Else Wenz-Viëtor , was launched at Spear, especially for children, and was first listed in the company catalog in 1919.
- First World War
The First World War also left behind with the "Soldiers' Quartet" (60 sheets) executed by JP Werth and that of Colonel a. DR Rädke designed “ Heerführer -Quartett” from 1915, whose pompous accompanying text still propagated a glorious victory of the Central Powers , left his mark. The latter depicted German and Austrian military personnel on 60 sheets, such as Hindenburg , Eduard von Böhm-Ermolli or Max von Gallwitz .
Board games on special topics
- Games for travel and transportation
In addition to a general “travel game” (1926) with 75 stations, board games were only available for Germany for the Rhine journey that has been very popular since the 19th century , the Harz region (“Harz journey”, around 1925), Bavaria (“Durch's Bayernland”, 1926) and the coastal area of the North and Baltic Seas ("Germany's ports and coasts") developed. The other German landscapes were not taken into account. The first edition of the Rheinreise around 1900 was very elaborate with a large-format game board with another smaller one, four Rhine steamers and six toy figures made of tin. In the later variant, available from the early 1920s, the Rhine steamship and the additional inner course were dispensed with; the cover image was modernized again in the 1930s.
As a German-speaking travel destination, Switzerland (“Die Schweizer Reise”) had been processed. In addition to the trips through individual landscapes - probably after the First World War - “On the fly through Germany, Austria and Switzerland” was also offered, which touched upon larger German locations as well as Zurich and Vienna in Switzerland and Austria.
When it comes to the travel games with foreign destinations, the "Berlin-Baghdad" train journey, which was created with the assistance of Curt Floericke during the First World War, should first be mentioned, the starting point of which was Berlin and which initially took the form of a round trip across the Balkans and the Middle East ( Constantinople ) and then on the tracks of the Baghdad Railway via Konia , Aleppo and Mosul finally led to Baghdad . The picture on the cover adorned the image of the " Balkan suit ", which in 1916 replaced the legendary Orient Express , which was discontinued due to the war . Around 1925 the game was reissued under the title "Die Orientreise".
“A Journey in the Airship ” (1909), started in Friedrichshafen and led back to Lake Constance via many European capitals and New York . During a trip around the world that had to be completed by plane (“In flight around the earth”, 1932), the globe was half circled from New York to London. A railway race (" Rail Race "), which was brought onto the market in 1946 exclusively in an English version , introduced many economically or culturally important places on the British Isles.
Other games deal with traditional and modern means of transport without actually having to pass existing routes in the course of the game, such as "Die Luftreise" (modernized variant 1936), "A flight in an airplane " (1910), "Die Autofahrt" (around 1925) or “The 'Electric' ” (around 1904).
- Sports games
Sports games were played in great variety. For many years, the "Race Race" (1904), a horse racing game , was on the program. In addition, there were the winter sports games “Ice Skating” (1925), “Skilauf” (around 1925) and “Tobogganing” (around 1900) as well as the “Obstacle Run” (1932), the “Cup Football Game” (1925) "Paddle ride" (around 1930) or the glider game "Take off - run - go" (1936). With the increasing motorization, racing games were also discussed. The “Grand Prix of Germany. Nürburg Race ”was on offer from around 1927 until the 1950s. There was also "The Hill Climb" and "The Motorcycle Race " (both 1932).
- Adventure games
Some adventure games were also published by Spear: "The discovery of the North Pole " (1910), the " Pathfinder game" (1914), "Undersea Adventure" (diving adventure in the sea, 1981, by Hans Hass ), or Kon-Tiki (1967 ), based on Thor Heyerdahl's Pacific crossing. The game "South Sea adventures", designed in Great Britain and manufactured in Fürth, was launched for English-speaking countries as early as 1928.
- Games from the world of fairy tales and stories
On fairy tale materials based u. a. the games “ The Wolf and the 7 Little Goats ” from 1933 and “ Die Bremer Stadtmusikanten ” from 1926 and, more recently, the game “ Hansel and Gretel ” designed by Rudi Hoffmann (around 1975). In 1967, based on the fairy tale by Gerdt von Bassewitz from 1912, “ Peterchens Mondfahrt ” and “ Pünktchen und Anton ”, based on Erich Kästner 's children's novel from 1931, were presented. Since 1990, “ Asterix . The Board Game ”, which was only published in English, is based on the stories told by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo about a Gallic village in Roman times .
- First and Second World War
In addition to the quartets, there were also board games with war themes. For example, from the First World War, the game “The Submarine War ” with six pewter submarines and a game board . There was even an " Iron Cross " as a trophy for particularly successful players.
During the Second World War there was an updated version of the “U-Boat War” with “U-Boats drive against England” as well as the games “East-Northeast Course” (1939) and “Bombs on England” (both 1940), the above have already been mentioned.
Scrabble
After J. Schowanek, based in Piding (near Berchtesgaden), had received a license for the now world-famous Scrabble letter placement game for the markets in Germany, Italy and some other European countries from 1953 , JW Spear & Sons was able to take over the license in 1958 . In the following years, the production and distribution of the Scrabble game became a crucial pillar for the company. It was also marketed under this trademark until recently after Mattel took over JW Spear & Sons.
Designer of the games
After the First World War, Gustav Müller (1899–1990), operating under the name “Maler Müller / Atelier für Werbekunst u. Buchgrafik / Nürnberg ”, as the designer of a large number of Spear games. After initially only designing brochures and advertisements for the game manufacturer or only contributing cover illustrations, he later also delivered complete designs such as “Die Autofahrt” (1935), “Die Luftreise” or the glider game (both 1936). Although he had very good working contacts with Hermann and Richard Spear, this did not prevent him from making game designs for Hanns Porst after the Aryanization. “Among other things, the unspeakable games 'Course East – Northeast' (1939), 'U-Boats drive against England' and 'Bombs on England' (both 1940) were attributed to the graphic artist from Nuremberg.”
His most important post-war work was the revision of the box design for the bestseller "Scrabble", in which he replaced the simple, wine-red original design from the USA with the illustration of the game board on a green background with the dominant red and white Scrabble logo. The latter two elements are still in use.
Other game designers and book illustrators working for Spear included a. Otto Kubel , Johann Peter Werth ("JP Werth") and Irma Graeff ("Aunt Irma") and, after 1945, Rudi Hoffmann .
Company catalogs, advertising
- Customer catalogs
The company summarized its offers in customer catalogs early on. The earliest is known from 1904. Under the title “Games. Illustrated price list from JW Spear & Sons. Nürnberg-Doos ”, over 130 articles have already been presented. The offer ranged from classic board games, such as mill, checkers and halma, to popular entertainment games, including the ladder game, the goose game and the flying hats (trademark entry 1899), to table tennis, which was popular at the time . The latter was also a salon game for the bourgeoisie and was delivered to retailers in 24 different equipment variants at prices for the dozen from 4 to 96 marks . Most of the games in the catalog were delivered in 4 price levels of 50 pfennigs as well as 1, 2 and 3M.
In the next catalog from 1910, 200 board games were presented in words and pictures on 55 pages. In games that had already been offered earlier, the cover images of the play boxes had often been adapted to the changing taste of the public. New in the offer were above all games that reflected the state of development of modern means of transport: “Die 'Elektro'”, “Eine Reise im Luftschiff” as well as “Ein Flug im Aeroplan” and “On the fly through Germany, Austria and Switzerland”.
- Representative portfolios
Commercial agents or traveling salesmen of the company, the toy retailer to showcase the games range in the field sought out were equipped at least in the 1930s with Folders, which mainly included the original cover illustrations of game boxes contained in the offer or books. The visual effect of the different equipment variants of the games, which was reflected in the box size, could be presented to the retailers in connection with the corresponding price information for the purchase decision.
- Magazine advertising
After the Second World War, the games manufacturer mainly worked with advertising leaflets and advertisements in relevant magazines. Corresponding offer catalogs have also been compiled for trade and trade fairs. In the 1960s and 1970s, Spear used multi-colored fan-folds, on which the current range was listed, sorted according to the headings: board games, puzzles, games of skill, activity games and craft bags.
- Spearitus
At the end of the 1970s, the company developed the character of "Spearitus" as a play on words derived from the company name Spear as part of a new advertising strategy - it included an "innovative catalog design, competition and new sales displays" . There were small advertising booklets of this figure, who appeared as a harnessed knight, in which comic-like reports were made of his travels through the company's current toy world. The Spearitus was also on stickers with a diameter of approx. 10 cm and the slogan: "ALWAYS FUN WITH SPEAR-GAMES. The playmakers ”used. Incidentally, it can also be found on a commemorative medal for the 100th anniversary of the Spear company in Germany. It depicts a knight with a spear and is labeled “100 YEARS OF SPEAR-SPIELE”.
Spear's Games Archive (German Games Archive Nuremberg) and Nuremberg Toy Museum
Many prototypes of the games sold were in the Spear's Games Archive, founded by Francis Spear in 1996 in Hertfordshire, England . For reasons of age, the archive was handed over to the German Games Archive in Nuremberg's Pellerhaus by its founder in June 2017 . The inventory joins the large collection of Spear games already in the Nuremberg Toy Museum , which was presented in 1997 as part of a comprehensive exhibition on game production by JW Spear & Sons and its history in Germany and England. Even then, a number of loans from Hertfordshire were already on view in Nuremberg.
literature
- Hugo Kastner: Family card games from 1889 to 1938. In: Trödler & Sammeln. July 2000, p. 156 ff. ( Online , accessed on February 5, 2016)
- Helmut Schwarz, Marion Faber: The playmakers. JW Spear & Sons - History of a Game Factory . Museums of the City of Nuremberg Toy Museum, Nuremberg 1997, ISBN 3-921590-50-7 .
- Helmut Schwarz: Spear. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 24, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-428-11205-0 , p. 634 f. ( Digitized version ).
Web links
- Website of the German Games Archive Nuremberg . In particular the virteull exhibitions
- Virtual depot in the Nuremberg Toy Museum with search option for 604 Spear games (manufacturer input)
- Spear games in the Luding games database
- Spear games at the European Game Collectors Guild
Individual evidence
- ↑ The company was founded as a sole proprietorship and later became an open trading company . At times Spear was later run again as a sole proprietorship, for example by Jacob Wolf Spear (1886-1891) and, after the so-called Aryanization , Hanns Porst (1939-1948). Spear Germany was converted into a GmbH in 1978. In 1966 the English parent company went public on the London Stock Exchange.
- ^ So Helmut Schwarz: Die Spielmacher. JW Spear & Sons - History of a Game Factory . Nuremberg 1997, p. 50, with reference to the death report in the daily newspaper “Fränkischer Kurier” from September 3, 1893 - with the same wording also the obituary notice of the Spear family in the same sheet of the same day - and the thanks there from September 6, 1893. Admittedly The Prager Tagblatt reported on August 8, 1893, p. 8 ( ANNO Online ) that the “Fürth industrialist Spear, the senior of the Spear and Sons company, who was arrested on suspicion of arson last week, ... in prison ( hanged) ”. In view of the contrary press releases directly on the spot, the press release of the Prager Tagblatt is likely to be a false report.
- ↑ With this game "every party member should like to think back to the uplifting hours spent in Nuremberg, the city of the Nazi party rallies" ". (Helmut Schwarz, Marion Faber: Die Spielmacher. JW Spear & Sons - History of a game factory . Nuremberg 1997, p. 87)
- ↑ UK: Single market - A European firm that does mince its words. Management Today, March 1, 1993, accessed October 20, 2012 .
- ^ A b c Hugo Kastner: Family card games from 1889 to 1938. In: Trödler & Sammeln. July 2000, p. 156 ff. ( Online )
- ↑ Werth's initials and sometimes even his name are printed once on almost all area quartets in the game. Little is known about the artist, however. According to information from the Rothenburg ob der Tauber town archive, the artist was born on February 4th, 1876 in Wuppertal-Barmen and died in Rothenburg ob der Tauber on December 3rd, 1960, where he was entered in the 1950 address book under the address "Schweinsdorfer Straße 10, Kunstmaler" is; the information given by the DNB with the year of death 1961 ( d-nb.info ) is therefore incorrect. According to the Nuremberg address books, Werth was there at several addresses between 1914 and 1942, most recently at “Blumröderstr. 17, II ", reported. It is also listed in: Manfred Grieb (Hrsg.): Nürnberger Künstlerlexikon. Visual artists, artisans, scholars, collectors, cultural workers and patrons from the 12th to the middle of the 20th century. 4 volumes. Munich 2007.
- ^ Ernst Krumbein: Family card games between 1850 and WWI . Article on the website of the European Game Collectors Guild ( online )
- ↑ Compare the images on the World of Playing Cards website .
- ↑ Compare the images on the World of Playing Cards website .
- ^ The graphic artist and animal painter Walter Heubach (1865–1923) illustrated a. a. also Brehm's animal life .
- ^ Helmut Schwarz, Marion Faber: Die Spielmacher. JW Spear & Sons - History of a Game Factory . Nuremberg 1997, p. 143 ff.
- ↑ Compare the images on the Boardgamegeek website .
- ^ Helmut Schwarz, Marion Faber: Die Spielmacher. JW Spear & Sons - History of a Game Factory . Nuremberg 1997, p. 140.
- ↑ Compare the website: Wolfgang Gierstorfer: The fairy tale cards of Otto Kubel . In: Amperland . 22. 1986, pp. 164-168.
- ↑ Such a folder with the dimensions 40.3 x 25.8 x 2 cm and consisting of 31 sheets with offers on glossy paper and 5 blank sheets was sold on an Internet platform in June 2020. Compare the temporary link .
- ^ Helmut Schwarz, Marion Faber: Die Spielmacher. JW Spear & Sons - History of a Game Factory . Nuremberg 1997, p. 117.
- ↑ Helmut Schwarz: Back on Los ( museums blog of June 29, 2017 ).
- ↑ Compare Hugo Kastner's website .