TSR, Inc.

TSR, Inc. was an American game publishing company, best known as the original publisher of Dungeons & Dragons (D&D). Its earliest incarnation, Tactical Studies Rules, was founded in October 1973 by Gary Gygax and Don Kaye. Gygax had been unable to find a publisher for D&D, a new type of game he and Dave Arneson were co-developing, so he founded the new company with Kaye to self-publish their products. Needing financing to bring their new game to market, Gygax and Kaye brought in Brian Blume in December as an equal partner. Dungeons & Dragons is generally considered the first tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG), and established the genre. When Kaye died suddenly in 1975, the Tactical Studies Rules partnership restructured into TSR Hobbies, Inc. and accepted investment from Blume's father Melvin. With the popular D&D as its main product, TSR Hobbies became a major force in the games industry by the late 1970s. Melvin Blume eventually transferred his shares to his other son Kevin, making the two Blume brothers the largest shareholders in TSR Hobbies.

TSR Hobbies ran into financial difficulties in the spring of 1983, prompting the company to split into four independent businesses, with game publishing and development continuing as TSR, Inc. (TSR). After losing their executive positions, the Blume brothers subsequently sold their shares to TSR Vice President Lorraine Williams, who in turn engineered Gygax's ouster from the company in October 1985. TSR saw prosperity under Williams, but encountered financial trouble in the mid-1990s. While their overall sales and revenue were healthy, TSR's high costs meant the company nevertheless became unprofitable and deeply in debt. TSR was left unable to cover its publishing costs due to a variety of factors. Facing insolvency, TSR was purchased in 1997 by Wizards of the Coast (WotC). WotC initially continued using the TSR name for D&D products, but by 2000, the TSR moniker was dropped, coinciding with the release of the 3rd edition of Dungeons & Dragons.

WotC allowed the TSR trademark to expire in the early 2000s. Two other companies have since used the TSR trademark commercially.

Tactical Studies Rules (TSR) was formed in 1973 as a partnership between Gary Gygax and Don Kaye, who collected together $2,400 for costs related to startup, to formally publish and sell the rules of Dungeons & Dragons, the creation of Gygax and Dave Arneson and the first modern role-playing game (RPG). The first TSR release, however, was Cavaliers and Roundheads, a miniature game, to start generating income for TSR. The partnership was subsequently joined by Brian Blume in December 1973. Blume was admitted to the partnership to fund further publishing of D&D, as Cavaliers and Roundheads was not a commercial success. In the original configuration of the partnership, Kaye served as president, Blume as vice-president, and Gygax as editor.

In January 1974, TSR—with Gygax using his basement as a headquarters—produced 1,000 copies of D&D, selling them for $10 each (and the required extra dice for another $3.50 - equivalent to about $86 in 2024). This first print sold out in 10 months. In January 1975, TSR printed a second batch of 1,000 copies of D&D, which took only another five or six months to sell out. Also in 1974, TSR published Warriors of Mars, a miniatures rules book set in the fantasy world of Barsoom, originally imagined by Edgar Rice Burroughs in his series of novels about John Carter of Mars, to which Gygax paid homage in the preface of the first edition of D&D. However, Gygax and TSR published the Mars book without permission from (or payment to) the Burroughs estate. Warriors of Mars was quietly dropped from the catalog and never reprinted.

When Don Kaye died of a heart attack on January 31, 1975, his role was taken over by his wife Donna Kaye, who remained responsible for accounting, shipping, and the records of the partnership through the summer. By the summer of 1975, those duties became complex enough that Gygax himself became a full-time employee of the partnership in order to take them over from Donna Kaye. Arneson also entered the partnership in order to coordinate research and design with his circle in the Twin Cities.

Brian Blume and Gary Gygax reorganized the business from a partnership to a corporation called TSR Hobbies, Inc. At first, it was a separate company to market miniatures and games from other companies, an enterprise which was also connected to the opening of the Dungeon hobby shop in Lake Geneva. TSR Hobbies then moved to buy out the old TSR partnership's assets. Brian's father, Melvin Blume, invested $20,000 in the nascent company which enabled it to buy out Donna Kaye's share of the original TSR partnership. On September 26, 1975, the assets of the former partnership were transferred to TSR Hobbies. Brian Blume became the largest shareholder, Melvin Blume the second largest, and Gary Gygax the third largest. Gygax served as president of TSR Hobbies, and Blume as vice president and secretary. The Dungeon hobby shop would become the effective headquarters of the company, including the offices of Blume and Gygax. TSR Hobbies subcontracted the printing and assembly work in October 1975, and the third printing of 2,000 copies of D&D sold out in five months. Tim Kask was hired in the autumn of 1975 as Periodicals Editor, and the first employee that TSR hired for full-time work.

Empire of the Petal Throne was the first game product released by TSR Hobbies, followed by two D&D supplements, Greyhawk and Blackmoor. Also released in 1975 were the board game Dungeon! and the Wild West RPG Boot Hill. The company took $300,000 in revenues for the fiscal year of 1976. TSR started hosting the Gen Con Game Fair in 1976, and the first D&D open tournament was held at the convention that year. D&D supplements Eldritch Wizardry and Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes were released in 1976. Also in 1976, the company opened The Dungeon Hobby Shop at 723 Williams Street and TSR Hobbies moved out of Gygax's home and into the building, with its offices upstairs from the hobby shop.