He sold it from his barbershop at first, and local businesses began to sell it as well. When his family and friends began to play more and more, he spent $8,000 to have 5,000 copies of the game made. The game was originally developed in 1971 by Merle Robbins in Reading, Ohio, a suburb of Cincinnati. Played with a specially printed deck, the game is derived from the crazy eights family of card games which, in turn, is based on the traditional German game of mau-mau. Uno ( / ˈ uː n oʊ/ from Spanish and Italian for 'one'), stylized as UNO, is a proprietary American shedding-type card game originally developed in 1971 by Merle Robbins in Reading, Ohio, a suburb of Cincinnati, that housed International Games Inc., a gaming company acquired by Mattel on January 23, 1992.
