Origin of the board game "Life"

In 1860, Mr. Milton Bradley was a successful lithographer whose major product was a portrait of Abraham Lincoln. When Mr. Lincoln grew his trademark beard, Bradley's clean-shaven portrait was no longer popular. Out of desperation, Mr. Bradley printed up several copies of a game he'd invented called, "The Checkered Game of Life." Its immediate popularity put Milton Bradley in the game business. This was Milton Bradley's first game. He sold 45,000 copies of the game by the end of the year. 

In 1959, Milton Bradley executives asked freelance toy and game inventor, Reuben Klamer, to come up with an appropriate game for the 100th anniversary of the company. Inspired by a "Checkered Game of Life" game board he saw in the Milton Bradley archives, Klamer and a co-inventor developed The Game of Life® which was introduced in 1960. In 1992, The Game of Life® was updated to include Life Tiles which reward players for recycling their trash, learning CPR and saying "no" to drugs. Today, The Game of Life® is played all over the world in some 20 different languages.