# Origins Game Fair - Event: Convention - Date: 1975 – present - Houses: Avalon Hill, Chaosium - Canonical: https://www.lanternhall.org/culture/origins-game-fair/ > Named for Baltimore, cradle of the commercial wargame, Origins began in 1975 at Johns Hopkins University and became the industry's own convention, home of the Origins Awards and, since 1996, a fixture of Columbus, Ohio. **Why it matters:** Where Gen Con grew out of one club and one company, Origins was built by the trade as a whole. Its awards and hall of fame are the hobby's longest-running honors, and it was where RuneQuest and many other games first met the public. ## Quick answers **What is Origins Game Fair?** Named for Baltimore, cradle of the commercial wargame, Origins began in 1975 at Johns Hopkins University and became the industry's own convention, home of the Origins Awards and, since 1996, a fixture of Columbus, Ohio. **When did Origins Game Fair begin?** 1975 to the present. **Why does Origins Game Fair matter?** Where Gen Con grew out of one club and one company, Origins was built by the trade as a whole. Its awards and hall of fame are the hobby's longest-running honors, and it was where RuneQuest and many other games first met the public. ## What happened By the mid-1970s Baltimore could fairly claim to be the capital of the [Miniatures & Board Wargames](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/wargame/). [Avalon Hill](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/avalon-hill/), founded there in the 1950s, had turned the hobby into a commercial business with boxed board wargames, and a generation of players had learned logistics, zones of control and combat results tables from its games. In 1975 a local club, the Interest Group Baltimore, joined with Avalon Hill to stage a national convention at Johns Hopkins University on July 25–27. Don Greenwood, an Avalon Hill designer and the event's founder, proposed calling it "Origins" in honor of the city's role in the birth of the hobby. For its first two decades Origins was deliberately itinerant. Avalon Hill and its New York rival SPI took turns running it; the show went to Staten Island in 1977, Ann Arbor in 1978, Chester, Pennsylvania, in 1979 and 1980, then to San Mateo, Detroit, Dallas and Los Angeles. In 1978 management passed to the Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA), the trade body of the hobby-game industry, giving Origins a character different from [Gen Con](https://www.lanternhall.org/culture/gen-con/), which was owned by [TSR](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/tsr/). Origins belonged to the business as a whole. ## Why it mattered That neutrality made Origins the natural home for industry honors. The Origins Awards, presented each year for games of the previous year, began with categories for best professional and amateur games and magazines and an Adventure Gaming Hall of Fame; the historical wargame prizes, the Charles S. Roberts Awards, were originally part of the same ceremony before separating in the late 1980s. In 1978 the show also hosted H. G. Wells awards for roleplaying and miniatures games. *[Dragon](https://www.lanternhall.org/culture/dragon-magazine/)* collected a string of Origins Awards as best roleplaying magazine in the 1980s and 1990s, and the Hall of Fame came to include [Dave Arneson](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/dave-arneson/), [Richard Garfield](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/richard-garfield/) and [Larry Elmore](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/larry-elmore/) among many others. Origins was also a launch pad. [Chaosium](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/chaosium/)'s [*RuneQuest*](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/runequest/), one of the first major rivals to D&D, with its percentile skills and the Bronze Age world of Glorantha, debuted at the Ann Arbor show in July 1978. Because Origins was chartered to serve gaming in general, including wargames and miniatures, its halls mixed hex-and-counter veterans, roleplayers and board gamers in a way no single publisher's show could. ## Legacy In 1988 and 1992 Origins and Gen Con joined forces as a single convention in Milwaukee, and in 1990 Origins ran alongside [Dragon Con](https://www.lanternhall.org/culture/dragon-con/) in Atlanta. In 1996 GAMA ended the wandering and anchored the show at the Greater Columbus Convention Center in Ohio, where it has stayed. The name changed from Origins International Game Expo to Origins Game Fair in 2007. The modern show has had its troubles. Attendance hovered around 10,000–12,000 in the late 2000s before climbing to 20,642 in 2019. In 2020 GAMA first postponed the fair for the COVID-19 pandemic, then saw an online edition collapse after many volunteers and event runners withdrew over the organization's slow response to the Black Lives Matter protests; the in-person event was then cancelled for the first time in its history. Reports of harassment after the 2018 fair led GAMA to strengthen its anti-harassment policies. Recovery has been steady, with 17,706 visitors in 2024 and 19,171 in 2025. Origins remains smaller and more trade-minded than Gen Con, but it keeps something of 1975 about it: a convention named not for a company or a game but for where the hobby came from. ## Facts - The first Origins was held July 25–27, 1975, at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, organized with [Avalon Hill](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/avalon-hill/) and a local club, the Interest Group Baltimore. - Avalon Hill designer Don Greenwood suggested the name, a nod to Baltimore as the birthplace of the commercial wargame hobby. - The Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA) took over management in 1978 and still runs the show. - [Chaosium](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/chaosium/)'s [RuneQuest](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/runequest/) debuted at Origins in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in July 1978. - Origins merged with [Gen Con](https://www.lanternhall.org/culture/gen-con/) in Milwaukee in 1988 and 1992, and was held alongside [Dragon Con](https://www.lanternhall.org/culture/dragon-con/) in Atlanta in 1990. - The 1978 show also presented H. G. Wells awards for roleplaying and miniatures games of 1977. - Attendance reached 20,642 unique visitors in 2019; the 2020 show was cancelled, the first year without an Origins since 1975. ## Sources and further reading - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_Game_Fair) - [Wikipedia: Origins Award](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_Award) - [Origins Game Fair official site](https://www.originsgamefair.com/) --- From The Lantern Hall (https://www.lanternhall.org/), a museum of fantasy literature and roleplaying games.