Mrs. Butts was better at the game than her inventor spouse. Once she scored 234 for "quixotic." He admitted that she "beat me at my own game," literally.

Although Mr. Butts had invented a word game, he was stumped in naming it. He tried Lexiko, Criss Cross Words and simply It. But the big companies weren't buying It, under that or any other name.

The game was relegated to a novelty for a few hundred friends until one of them, James Brunot, retired from his day job in 1948 and volunteered to make and sell the game. He coined the catchy Scrabble label, but the little enterprise still lost money, producing a few dozen sets a week.

Suddenly, in 1952, a vacationing Macy's executive saw Scrabble played at a resort, and the world's largest store began carrying it. Orders started pouring in. Thirty-five workers hired to churn out 6,000 sets a week could not meet the demand. Finally the operation was turned over to Selchow & Righter, which had rejected the game years before.

The Scrabble craze led to a deluxe set with revolving turntable, a pocket edition for travelers, a junior version for children, foreign-language versions, even a television program. Gamblers played it for money and Hollywood had a dirty-word variant. There were books on strategy and international tournaments for devotees.