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Pat Rumbaugh, a physical education teacher and tennis coach, wanted to promote play in her community of Takoma Park, Maryland. After contacting KaBOOM! for information, she invited a group of people to form a committee to promote indoor and outdoor play for all ages.

Team sports are organized games governed by a set of rules that are recognized and interpreted by an official governing body as the standard for play. The top team sports for children ages 6 through 17 are basketball, baseball, soccer, football, and volleyball. About 20 million American children play organized out-of-school sports with about 25 million playing competitive school sports.

Tetherball is a game that has been popular on playgrounds, schoolyards, and summer camps for years. The game involves two players who attempt to hit a ball attached to a pole by a rope in opposite directions until one of them wraps the rope completely around the pole and the ball stops. The history of the game is uncertain with some suggesting that in the ninth century it started with the Tatars.

The Ambiguity of Play was written by Brian Sutton-Smith and published in 1997. As a leading play theorist, Sutton-Smith considers the possible meanings of play as they have been debated and described in a range of disciplines including education, biology, psychology, and sociology.

The Baby Einstein Company, a division of the Walt Disney Company, offers multimedia products, toys, and baby products for children aged three months to 3 years old. Under the slogan of "Where Discovery Begins," they offer an introduction to the subjects of music, language, art, science, and mathematics from a baby's point-of-view.

The Complete Guide to Playground Development was written by Robert Collins and published in 2008. The book serves as a manual to guide the playground development process of commercial and public use playgrounds from design to final construction.

With multiple audiences in mind, The Developmental Benefits of Playgrounds, co-authored by Joe L. Frost, Pei-San Brown, John A. Sutterby, and Candra D. Thornton, focuses on the importance of playgrounds for children's broad developmental needs.

The Genius of Play™ is a national movement spearheaded by The Toy Association, with the mission to give families the information and inspiration needed to make play an important part of every child’s life.

Serving families in Washington, D.C., The Homeless Children's Playtime Project reduces the traumatic effects of homelessness on children who live in temporary housing programs as well as promotes their physical and psychological development.

Co-authored by Bill Michaelis and John M. O'Connell, The Leader's Handbook, Learning Leadership Skills by Facilitating Fun, Games, Play, and Positive Interaction is a practical guide for play leaders geared toward training them to manage all age groups and effectively lead games play and team-building activities.

The Nuts and Bolts of Playground Construction, written by Paul Hogan, is Volume 3 of A Trilogy of Play and focuses mainly on the "how" of creating play spaces. Written largely as a "how to" book complete with diagrams, designs, and copious pictures, Paul also spotlighted nations where play is honored and includes articles that highlight his philosophy of play.

The Play Movement in the United States, A Study of Community Recreation, written by Clarence E. Rainwater, PhD. was published in 1922 by The University of Chicago. The book is an analysis of the concept and structure of the play movement in the United States from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Professional playworker Penny Wilson has communicated the essence of the British playwork movement through The Playwork Primer, a 40 page booklet published by the Alliance for Childhood. She has endeavored to introduce playwork and the adventure playground concepts to the American play industry.

The Science of Play: How to Build Playgrounds That Enhance Children’s Development was written by Susan G. Solomon. The book uses recent data from the behavioral sciences to demonstrate how to design innovative, multifunctional spaces to allow children to take risks, experience failure but also have a chance to master difficult tasks, learn to plan and solve problems, exercise self-control, and develop friendships.

After a lifetime of collecting dolls and toys, in 1968 Margaret Woodbury Strong created the Margaret Woodbury Strong Museum of Fascination in her home in Rochester, New York. For more than a decade Margaret had been conducting official and unofficial tours of her collections, so she named the official museum after the way her guests would often describe her collections. She hoped her museum would "fascinate, educate, and entertain."

The Well-Played Game: A Player’s Philosophy was written by Bernard DeKoven and published in 2013. This updated book was originally published in 1978 and became a classic treatise on how human beings play together.

Themed Concepts creates custom Glass Fiber Reinforced Concrete (GFRC) play and nature features for playgrounds, water parks, zoos, museums, aquariums, restaurants, amusement centers, hotels, and religious centers. Based in Forest Lake, Minnesota, they believe that “If it can be imagined, it can be built.”

Theora Design is a business that creates and designs toys, games, crafts, dolls, electronic games, and novelties. They also collaborate with other toy and game inventors and encourage young entrepreneur designers. While others fear the electronic age has ended games, Theora Design believes that games are "enjoying a renaissance" as "people seek avenues for interacting with each other."

Physical education professional, Donna Thompson, founded the National Program for Playground Safety (NPPS) in 1995. Donna Thompson has been involved in playground safety research, education, and consulting. As Donna's interest in playgrounds became more and more focused on playground safety, she became involved in the establishment of safety standards.

Tonka Corporation began in 1947 as Mound Metalcraft Incorporated. They first began manufacturing steel toys and developed a large line of steel toy trucks among other products.

Charles Lazarus, the founder of Toys "R" Us, began selling baby furniture in 1948 in Washington D.C. Aiming for the post World War II baby boom market, Charles soon added rattles, cradle gyms, stuffed animals, tricycles, books, and toys. He called the store the Children's Bargain Town.

The Triax 2000 Surface Impact Tester (SIT) is a portable, free-fall playground surface impact tester. Children falling from playground equipment account for 79% of all playground equipment related injuries each year. The Triax 2000 is used to assess the safety of the surfacing below the playground equipment based on the height of the equipment.

TÜV SÜD America is a technical inspection company that provides third-party safety testing, inspection, and certification services.