Milton Bradley

Bradley published tracts and pamphlets on Friedrich Fröbel's kindergarten system. His company produced two magazines, Kindergarten News (later Kindergarten Review), and Work and Play. Neither was profitable, and Bradley's business partners withdrew their support, but Bradley persevered, publishing both magazines until the end of his life. His friend George Tapley bought out the partner's shares so that Bradley could continue manufacturing educational materials.

By the 1890s, the Milton Bradley Company had introduced the first standardized watercolor sets. Bradley based these materials on a six-spectrum color system. This color system included eighteen pure spectrum colors along with two systematic tints and shades, allowing colors to be reproduced with greater accuracy. As well as the watercolor sets, Bradley also established educational games such as Bradley's Word Builder and Bradley's Sentence Builder. Bradley was also the first to release crayon packages with standardized colors, a forerunner of the Binney & Smith company's Crayola crayons and Artista art supplies. Bradley's interest in art education also led him to produce a new color wheel and publish four books about teaching colors.

In 1860, Bradley married Vilona Eaton. They had no children. She died in 1867. In 1869, he married his second wife, Ellen "Nellie" Thayer. Bradley and Nellie had two daughters.

Milton Bradley died on May 30, 1911, in Springfield, Massachusetts, at age 74. He was buried in Springfield Cemetery in a family plot alongside his father Lewis (1810–1890), his mother Fanny (1813–1872), and his first wife Vilona. His second wife Nellie was buried there after her death in 1918.

In 2004, he was posthumously inducted into the Toy Industry Hall of Fame along with George Ditomassi of Milton Bradley Company.

In 2006, Bradley was posthumously inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.