The Acquisitions Table: The New Pretty Village

The New Pretty Village. Church Set. New York: McLoughlin Bros., 1897.

The McLoughlin Brothers dominated both the picture book and game markets in late 19th-century America, and The New Pretty Village is a wonderful example of McLoughlin’s halcyon era. This segment of the ideal suburban village includes cardboard models of a church, a stately house, a cozy cottage, and a florist’s greenhouse, along with trees, bushes, and villagers that can be posed on metal perches. The chromolithographed box shows the church set in its visual context with other village segments. It is truly rare to get a McLoughlin game in such great condition, and the AAS curator of graphic arts, Lauren Hewes, and I are inspired to collect the entire village, as acquisition funds permit!

Purchased from Helen Younger. Linda & Julian Lapides and Harry G. Stoddard Memorial Funds.

Further information:

  • You may be able to find the original price for The New Pretty Village in the McLoughlin Bros. catalogs, price lists, and order sheets in AAS collections — all are available online now as PDFs.
  • Find other interesting games listed in the AAS Games Inventory.

Published by

Laura Wasowicz

Curator of Children's Literature, American Antiquarian Society

One thought on “The Acquisitions Table: The New Pretty Village”

  1. I have just acquired one of these (no box, and less than complete I think). To the best of your knowledge, was the ‘New Pretty Village’ ever reissued in facsimile, perhaps around the 1950s? Thank you in advance for any information you are able to provide.

    John Copleston

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