The history of American mahjong
American mahjong is a hundred-year-old offshoot of the Chinese game, shaped by a 1920s fad, a league of New York women and a card that changes every year.
By Jerry Chen. Checked and updated November 1, 2026
Timeline
- Around 1920. Mahjong arrives in the United States. Joseph Park Babcock, an American working for Standard Oil in Soochow (Suzhou), China, writes simplified English rules that become an early American standard.
- The early 1920s. A national craze. Sets sell in huge numbers and players add their own table rules, and the rules become tangled. The craze peaks around 1924 and fades in the mid-1920s.
- 1924. The American Official Laws of Mah-Jongg tries to tidy up the tangle of American rules.
- 1937. The National Mah Jongg League is founded at a meeting in New York City "to standardize the game so that all Mah Jongg players would play the same hands and rules". It starts with 32 members. Tom Sloper's timeline places the meeting at the Essex House, with Viola Cecil as the first president; My Jewish Learning describes the founders as a group of Jewish women.
- The 1940s and 1950s. The game spreads among Jewish women's circles, passed from friend to friend and mother to daughter, and becomes a fixture of the Catskills bungalow colonies. Some sets start including jokers.
- 1961. Jokers become part of the League's game; before this, flowers were the wild tiles. The League settles on 8 flowers and 8 jokers with the 1971-72 card.
- 1986. The League sponsors the first International Mah Jongg Tournament at Sea with Mah Jongg Madness, helping to set tournament standards.
- 2005 and 2011. Gladys Grad of Mah Jongg Madness codifies standardized tournament rules for League-style events (2005), and Mah Jongg Madness introduces Mah Jongg Master Points to rank tournament players (2011-12).
- Today. The League says it has over 350,000 members and still publishes a new card every year. Since the 2020s the game has found a younger audience, with designer sets, social clubs and lessons in many US cities.
Why the card changes every year
The League's founding idea was that everyone should play the same hands by the same rules. Publishing a new card each year keeps the game fresh, stops players from memorizing hands, and gives the League a way to adjust the game. As the League puts it, it "changes the hands and rules to add more excitement to the game."
How old sets show the history
You can roughly date an American set by its flowers and jokers. Sets from the 1920s typically have 8 flowers and no jokers. More flowers appear from the 1940s, and jokers become standard in 1961. That is why many vintage sets need joker stickers before they work for today's game. How to identify and date a vintage set.
The Jewish American connection
Mahjong became woven into Jewish American life through the League's founders and through decades of synagogue, sisterhood and community games. Many Jewish organizations still raise money by selling the League's card each year. Historians also point to other threads, including Jewish refugees who learned the game in Shanghai during the Second World War.
Common questions
Who invented American mahjong?
No single person. Mahjong came from China; Americans adapted it in the 1920s, and the National Mah Jongg League, founded in New York in 1937, standardized the American rules and hands.
When did American mahjong start?
Mahjong reached the US around 1920 and became a national craze in the early 1920s. The distinct American game took shape after the National Mah Jongg League was founded in 1937.
Why do so many Jewish women play mahjong?
A group of Jewish women founded the National Mah Jongg League in 1937, and the game spread through Jewish social circles in New York and beyond, including the Catskills bungalow colonies. Synagogue groups and Hadassah chapters still sell the yearly card.
When were jokers added to American mahjong?
Gradually. Some American sets had jokers in the 1940s and 1950s, and according to mahjong historian Tom Sloper jokers became part of the League's game in 1961. Early 1920s sets have no jokers.
Sources: Tom Sloper, mah-jongg history timeline (FAQ 11); National Mah Jongg League, about the League; Wikipedia: American mahjong; My Jewish Learning: Is Mah-Jongg a Jewish game?; Tom Sloper on dating sets by flowers and jokers; J. The Jewish News of Northern California on younger players.