{"id":3928,"date":"2008-04-12T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-04-12T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/blog\/2008\/04\/12\/jati-game-designer-discovered\/"},"modified":"2008-04-12T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2008-04-12T10:00:00","slug":"jati-game-designer-discovered","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/blog\/2008\/04\/12\/jati-game-designer-discovered\/","title":{"rendered":"JATI Game Designer Discovered!"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n
\n
\"cover\"\/<\/a><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
designer<\/td>\nKeith Havens<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
publisher<\/td>\n3M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
released<\/td>\n1966<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
players<\/td>\n2-4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
playing time<\/td>\n20\u00a0minutes<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
rating<\/td>\n–<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

\nJATI Game Designer Discovered!<\/a><\/h2>\n

by Aaron Haag<\/p>\n

“I am surprised to find in all the research I have done on the 3M Bookshelf Game JATI
\nthat no one credits the author\/designer of the game. I have a Minneapolis Tribune newspaper article
\npublished December 5, 1965 about the designer, Keith Havens of Mound, Minnesota.<\/i>“<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"Keith<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Keith Havens
1965<\/i><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

These are the first two sentences of an email I received from Sheri McNally on 6 April 2008.
\nTaking the fact that I had researched on the JATI in the internet when we published Moritz’
\narticle on the game and couldn’t find any information on the author I first took this as a
\nbelated April Fools Day joke.<\/p>\n

Luckily, we have G\u00fcnther in our gaming group, one of the experts on 3M games and I forwarded the
\nemail to him asking for his opinion. His first reaction: “Looks like a joke but let’s
\ncheck.” So he got in touch with Sheri via email and Sheri was so kind to scan the newspaper
\narticle and send it to him as a proof. She had found the newspaper clipping in the bottom of the
\nbox of her JATI game that she had bought at a garage sale.<\/p>\n

The article is a piece on Keith Havens, an artist and game designer, describing how he works on
\ngame designs and his attempts to get them published. Asked what games are most difficult to sell
\nhis answer was: strategy games, because people don’t like to think. Quite an interesting
\nstatement and I wonder if that was just his personal opinion about what people liked to play or if
\nit was typical for the time\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"JATI<\/span><\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
click on above picture to download
\n
\nan OCR’ed version of the newspaper article<\/i><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

Very little can be found in the internet about Keith Havens, in fact there is only one reference
\nabout his style of painting in an article about an exhibition<\/a> at
\nthe James J. Hill
\nHouse<\/a> in St. Paul, Minnesota and a quote of him on the Dick Maw online gallery<\/a> website. His work as a game designer is not referenced
\nat all.<\/p>\n

The JATI game Sheri owns has “Keith Havens” printed on the label just under the name
\nof the game (and it looks like it is actually part of the label, not written on), and she is
\nwondering if there are any other copies of JATI out there with his name on the front label. This
\nmight have been an original prototype label or perhaps a special label done for Keith Havens,
\nthough none of the other 3M Bookshelf Games include the designer on the label. If somebody knows
\nmore about this please give Sheri a feedback (sheri_mc (at) hotmail.com) or leave a comment here
\nusing the feedback option below.<\/p>\n

The news about the now discovered designer of JATI has already spread fast in the 3M game
\ncollectors community and game collectors’ catalogues are being updated already with this piece
\nof information. Thanks again to Sheri for informing us and sending us the article.<\/p>\n

Find out more about the Jati game on the pages of the pages of the
\nEuropean Game Collectors Guild<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n