Charles S. Roberts

Charles Swann Roberts (February 3, 1930 – August 20, 2010,Baltimore, Maryland) was a wargame designer, railroad historian, and businessman. He is renowned as "The Father of Board Wargaming", having created the first modern wargame (a boardgame) in 1952, and the first wargaming company in 1954. He is also the author of a series of books on railroad history, published by the small publishing firm, Barnard, Roberts, and Company, Inc.

Charles S. Roberts created the first board wargame for the mass market, Tactics, in an apartment in Catonsville, Maryland in 1952. In 1954, out of a garage in Avalon, Maryland, he began selling it via mail-order as The Avalon Game Company, and Roberts formed Avalon Hill in 1958 to publish Tactics II (1958), the newest incarnation of his wargame.Tactics II improved on the basic game design of his earlier effort, and formed the genesis for the concept of the combat results table. In 1958 he published Gettysburg, considered to be the first board wargame based upon an actual historical battle, with subsequent versions in 1961 and 1964.

Hard hit by a recession, Roberts turned over Avalon Hill to one of his creditors, Eric Dott of Monarch Services, in December 1963. Tom Shaw, an old friend of Roberts and the only person to stay on from the original company, oversaw the company's successful period from 1963-1982.

Starting in 1988, Roberts' name was given to the Charles S. Roberts Awards, given for excellence in the historical wargaming hobby. He was a charter member of the Charles Roberts Awards Hall of Fame.

In 1999 Pyramid magazine named Charles S. Roberts as one of The Millennium's Most Influential Persons "at least in the realm of adventure gaming."

...
Wikipedia