Game of The Spider's Web

[EPHEMERA] [JUVENILE GAME] [ILLUSTRATED]. Directions title: Game of The Spider's Web. For Two, Three, or Four Players.

(10 ¼" x 8 ½") box of stiff paper board with a lid; chromolithographed titled pictorial on the lid features a young girl in a pink dress sitting on the grass with a spider next to her; the brightly colored game board is attached to the inside of the box; the wood game pieces and the spinner are included; rubbing to box corners with splits, scuffing to edges; very good plus. Not recorded.

Decorative chromolithographed paper featuring a young girl sitting on the grass eating a bowl of porridge (?), fending off a spider with her arm. The spider is dangling from a web and holds a miniature chair with one leg and a top hat with another. The pictorial is reminiscent of the nursery rhyme, Little Miss Muffet.

This children's basic circulation-style game is complete with directions printed on the inside of the lid and a bright chromolithographed game board is affixed to the inner panel of box base. Included are small wooden cone-shaped game pieces each painted a different color representing "flies." An "indicator" formed from a square of stiff board and onlaid with a color printed circle is divided into eight numbered sections, the numbers are printed on the body of a red or blue spider, an illustration of a fly appears at each corner, and a brass arrow spinner attached to a grommet in the center. The object of the game is "to see which fly can buzz around the spider's web without being caught." Spinning the arrow on the indicator gives the highest spin the right to take the first turn. The player's objective is to move his fly and skip the spaces containing a spider, as they move in the direction of the center of the web. If a player lands on a spider, they must move towards the center of the web where the large spider is located. The winning player has the "fly" that has not been caught in the center of the web.

This was a ten-cent board game offered by McLoughlin Brothers as part of their "New Household Series, Assorted" games which included six named games: Leap Frog, Bombardment, Catch the Rabbit, Bear Hunters, Walking the Tight Rope, and Game of The Spider's Web. (McLoughlin Order List, held by AAS).