This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 2/1/2025
Ouija Queen. Omaha: American Novelty Co., ca. 1940s. Hardboard covered in lithographed paper and a cardboard planchette. 11 ½ x 17 ¾". Scuffing, staining, and chipping to paper. Good.“Artist and burgeoning entrepreneur James Acuff designed Ouija Queen in the early 1940s, taking out a $25,000 loan from the Iowa Finance Company to fund the manufacturing effort of his new talking board. Acuff failed to account for wartime material shortages that left plywood blanks for talking boards a rare commodity, and soon his capital was expended. Rather than allow Acuff to default on the loan, the finance company's director, Isadore Chapman, offered to take over production and marketing rights to see the endeavor through, and the new partnership birthed the American Novelty Company. To sidestep the raw material issue, Chapman turned to using blank composite boards made from wood particles that were primarily used in the home construction industry, covering them in paper printed with Acuff's Ouija Queen design. The vital manufacturing shift, combined with Chapman's uncanny ability to coerce executives into giving the Ouija Queen prominent placement in some of the country's most popular mail-order catalogs, including Montgomery Ward, resulted in one of the most popular and iconic boards of the era." – Brandon Hodge, The Mysterious Planchette