How did this almost escape me?

H.G. Wells and friends maneuvering their armies around the parlor floor.  Considering where this falls on the wargaming historical spectrum.  Sometime before Featherstone, but after von Hellwig and von Reisswitz.  Might we, therefore, consider Little Wars Late Middle Old School Wargaming? 

The opportunity to read the Sunday paper two days late certainly has its advantages.  Once in a great while, you run across something about our wonderful hobby that doesn't present it in a goofy, uninformed, negative light.  You know the familiar implication:  These guys are a bunch of unsocialized morons in ill-fitting t-shirts and sagging cargo shorts, with matted hair and horrendous body odor, who live with fish tanks full of newts in lieu of an actual S.O., spouse, or partner and, thus, have nothing better to do with their time.  Anyway, I just came across this interesting little essay in the Book Review supplement of this past Sunday's New York Times that is refreshingly different in its outlook and approach.  Take a look if you'd like.  Click on Little Wars to be magically transported to the text in question.