Marble (toy) of marble games to a meadow outside the town. It is unknown where marbles were first manufactured, but the "original" marbles were designated "made in Germany". The game has become popular throughout the US and other countries. Ceramic marbles entered inexpensive mass production in the 1870s. A German glassblower invented marble scissors, a device for making marbles, in 1846. The first mass-produced toy marbles (clay) made in the US were made in Akron, Ohio, by S. C. Dyke, in the early 1890s. Some of the first US-produced glass marbles were also made in Akron, by James Harvey Leighton. In 1903,
Elgin Marbles Parthenon, which is regarded as one of the world's greatest cultural monuments. International efforts to repatriate the Marbles to Greece were intensified in the 1980s by then Greek Minister of Culture Melina Mercouri, and there are now many organisations actively campaigning for the Marbles' return, several united as part of the International Association for the Reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures. The Greek government itself continues to urge the return of the marbles to Athens so as to be unified with the remaining marbles and for the complete Parthenon frieze sequence to be restored, through diplomatic, political and legal means. In