Collection Highlights
The Solitary Oak (The Old Oak)
1844
1858.75
Oil on canvas (relined)
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Museum Collections
Luce Center
Card game
Object name
Card game
Date
1901
Medium
Cardboard, paper, plastic
Dimensions
box: 1 x 15 1/8 x 14 1/2 in. ( 2.5 x 38.4 x 36.8 cm )
Description
"The Hand of Fate: Fortune Telling Game" board game in a cardboard box; on cover, illustration with figure of a girl dressed in a witch costume with a peaked red hat and a cape, teaching a black cat, both inside a ring with symbols of the zodiac, around the ring are black cats, bats and owls; box cover lithographed, "THE HAND OF FATE/ FORTUNE/ TELLING/ GAME/ McLOUGHLIN BRO'S/ NEW YORK./ COPYRIGHT 1901/ by McLOUGHLIN BROS./ NEW YORK."; one paper disc pasted to plastic case inside box; a sheet of printed paper with a circle cut out of center, with answers to the questions on the discs in circles bordering interior edge.
Credit Line
The Liman Collection
Object Number
2000.476
Marks
lithographed: on the box cover: "THE HAND OF FATE/ FORTUNE/ TELLING/ GAME/ McLOUGHLIN BRO'S/ NEW YORK./ COPYRIGHT 1901/ by McLOUGHLIN BROS./ NEW YORK."
Gallery Label
The Hand of Fate is one of many parlor games revealing Victorians' fascination with mysticism. The magnetic dial at the center can be employed to play different games depending on which of the surrounding rings is used. The innermost circle allows the "hand" to answer historical questions, the middle circle provides character reading based on a player's birthday, and the outer circle of numbers lets players ask true/false questions (even = true, uneven= false).
Due to ongoing research, information about this object is subject to change.
