ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, December 2, 1996 TAG: 9612020128
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: LONDON
TYPE: NEWS OBIT
SOURCE: Associated Press
AMID MYSTERY worthy of his own game, he's gone, but how did it happen?
It was a riddle worthy of the murder mystery board game Clue. But this time it was not Professor Plum in the parlor with a revolver.
Waddington's Games, which owns Clue, recently tried to track down inventor Anthony Pratt to help celebrate the game's 50th anniversary, but struck out.
It eventually offered a reward and set up a special phone line - which brought the information that the former law clerk died two years ago, at 90, in virtual obscurity.
``We had hoped to find Anthony Pratt alive and well, but we had no idea how old he might be, as the formal agreement ended with him many years ago,'' a Waddington's spokesman said.
``We understand that his wife is also dead and that the couple were childless. However, we are keeping our fingers crossed for a family member to come forward and accept a posthumous award.'' The company last heard from Pratt 10 years ago.
Gillian Lewis, superintendent of the Bromsgrove Municipal Cemetery near Birmingham, central England, called Waddington's to say Pratt was buried there in April 1994.
Waddington's at first hoped it may be another Pratt, but accepted the inevitable when Lewis confirmed that the marble headstone bears the inscription ``Inventor of Cluedo,'' the British name of the game.
Pratt came up with the Cluedo idea while working as a fire warden during World War II in the northern English city of Leeds.
``Between the wars all the bright young things would congregate in each other's homes for parties at weekends,'' he told the Birmingham Evening Mail in a 1990 interview.
``We'd play a stupid game called Murder where guests crept up on each other in corridors and the victim would shriek and fall on the floor.''
Pratt completed the game in 1947. Clue sold 150 million copies, and Pratt's share of the profits allowed him to leave his job and pursue his true love - playing the piano with an orchestra.
LENGTH: Short : 48 linesby CNB