WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT RADICAL PLAY…

WINNER OF THE 2024 LAWRENCE W. LEVINE AWARD FOR BEST BOOK IN AMERICAN CULTURAL HISTORY - FROM THE ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN HISTORIANS

WINNER OF THE 2024 RAY AND PAT BROWNE AWARD FOR BEST SINGLE WORK IN POPULAR CULTURE AND AMERICAN CULTURE - FROM THE POPULAR CULTURE ASSOCIATION

“An excellent account of the toy industry’s interaction with the political movements of the 1960s and 1970s”
— Alyssa Rosenberg, The Washington Post
“A readable and riveting narrative of a formative era of the 1960s. . . . Recommended. ”
— Choice
“Radical Play is an eye-opening history and a hopeful story for our own times.”
— Amy Ogata, author of Designing the Creative Child
“Eminently readable.”
— Letty Cottin Pogrebin
“Rob Goldberg tells terrific stories.... His critical and nuanced account of the toy world’s politics . . . [serves] as a model for how future researchers might engage with toys as primary sources.”
— Meredith Bak, author of Playful Visions

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ABOUT ROB GOLDBERG

Dr. Rob Goldberg is an author, historian, and educator. He holds a Ph.D. in American History from the University of Pennsylvania. He is Head of the History Department at Germantown Friends School.

Rob’s work has been featured or cited in The New Yorker, the New York Times, Sweet July, and the Washington Post Week in Ideas. His writing has been published in Ms. magazine and the Los Angeles Times. Recent guest appearances include WNYC’s The Brian Lehrer Show and the Playground Podcast with Chris Byrne.

Rob has also been an expert on TV and film documentaries, including the History Channel series The Toys That Built America (on the Cabbage Patch Kids and Garbage Pail spoof) and the new Sky Documentaries feature Barbie Uncovered (2024).

Rob loves to share his research on the social history of toys, and has been a guest speaker at numerous museums and universities—including the Strong Museum of Play, the Houston Toy Museum, University of Pennylvania, Rutgers University, Bard Grad Center, and the Center for Material Culture Studies. He’s available to give talks to groups, including educators and school groups K-12.

To contact Rob, click here. You can find him on Instagram @toyhistorian. More of his work can be found at Linktree.