Short answers, pulled from the story.
Bob Bledsaw founded Judges Guild on the 4th of July 1976 in Decatur, Illinois. He turned his homegrown Dungeons & Dragons campaign into a business while sitting in his living room surrounded by maps and character sheets.
City State of the Invincible Overlord was the first published role-playing game supplement to feature a fully developed city environment. This flagship product created a sprawling metropolis with its own history, politics, and economy before most game materials focused on isolated dungeons.
Judges Guild declined because its license to publish Advanced Dungeons & Dragons materials lapsed in 1982. The company refused to adapt to changing aesthetic standards while competitors moved toward professional typesetting and full-color art.
Necromancer Games published revised editions of the City State of the Invincible Overlord and the Player's Guide to the Wilderlands in 2002. This release occurred under license and in cooperation with Bob Bledsaw and other original writers.
The manuscript Lost Man's Trail was published in 2011, marking the first original product the company had produced in over 25 years. Bob Bledsaw died of cancer in 2008 and left the company to his son Bob Bledsaw II.