The Games we Played

[RJM62]

There's a thread in SZ titled "The Good Old Days" that's gotten into some pretty deep commentary about important social issues. But it also got me thinking about memories from the "good old days" that (I hope) should be less controversial, such as the games we played back then.

I grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Brooklyn -- I guess "lower working-class" would probably be more accurate because none of us had much money. This was before the days of home computers, the Internet, or even video games. Even color TV was considered a bit of a luxury. We really had very little in the way of toys -- practically none, actually, in comparison to the kids of today.

None of that mattered much, though, because we knew how to make our own fun, using very little because very little was what we had. We weren't particularly creative, however: Most of the games we played had been inherited from prior generations and were played with little variation from the previous generations' rules.

Oddly enough, I don't remember having been taught any of the games. There were no grown-ups explaining the rules to us nor serving as referees to enforce them. The games were just there. They seemed to have existences of their own. They were part of the fabric of growing up in Brooklyn. Each generation of kids simply grew into them, and then eventually grew out of them; but the games remained unchanged, generation after generation.

Here are a few of the games, along with brief descriptions and equipment requirements for those who may be unfamiliar with them. But in the interest of efficiency, let me first define one particularly ubiquitous piece of equipment that found its way into many of our games: the "spaldeen."

A spaldeen (pronounced spall-DEEN) was a pink, hollow, rubber ball made by the Spalding company, with the Spalding logo inked in black on the ball. They cost about a quarter. Supposedly they were defective tennis ball cores, but I have my doubts about that. They were the pink rubber balls of choice for our games because of their quality, durability, and consistent bounce characteristics. They were far superior to the "Super Pinkie," which was the cheaper rival pink rubber ball that no self-respecting kid in Brooklyn would be caught dead using.

That essential piece of equipment having been defined, let's look at the games.

Stickball
Equipment needed: A broomstick and a spaldeen. There also were actual stickball bats that were a bit thicker than broomsticks, but we usually just used broomsticks.
Description: Basically baseball adapted to the narrow streets of Brooklyn and played with a spaldeen and a broomstick. Typically home plate and second base were manhole covers, and first and third were the fenders of the cars parked at those positions. Fair territory was the area between the parked cars: Five foul balls would result in a batter being out.

Stoop Ball
Equipment Needed: A spaldeen
Description: The "batter" faces the stoop, with the fielders behind him, and throws the spaldeen against the steps. The distance the bounced ball travels before it is fielded determines whether it is a single, double, triple, or home run. These boundaries are decided before the game and marked with chalk on the sidewalk or pavement. If the ball is caught on the fly, or if the "batter" is hit by his own ball, the batter is out.

Kings
Equipment needed: A spaldeen
Description: I can find no record of this game having been played anywhere other than Brooklyn, but every kid in Brooklyn knew how to play it. It's significant to note that Brooklyn is Kings County, so possibly the game was, in fact, unique to Brooklyn.

Whatever its history, Kings was basically the same as Stoop Ball, except that it was played against a flat wall rather than a stoop. There was a square or rectangle chalked or painted on the wall and extending onto the sidewalk, and the "batter" had to hit the wall or sidewalk with the ball somewhere within that boundary, or else it was a strike. Other than that, the game was identical to Stoop Ball.

Asses Up
Equipment Needed: A spaldeen
Description: This was a very fast-moving game with two variations: Team, or Free-For-All. In the team form, the kids divided into two teams, with the last team to have a player standing the winner. In the free-for-all form, there were no teams. The last player standing was the winner.

In either form, play commenced when a "batter" threw the ball against a wall as hard as he could. In the team form, the ball had to be fielded by an opposing player. In the free-for-all form, the ball could be fielded by any player, including the batter. In either form, the ball could not be touched until it had bounced on the ground at least once. Upon fielding the ball, the fielder became the new batter and had to throw the ball against the wall. And so forth.

If a player was hit by the ball before it bounced, or if he fumbled the ball, he had to run toward the wall. In the meantime, an opposing player (or any player in the free-for-all form) had to field the ball and throw it at the wall.

If the ball reached that wall before the player, the player had to stand facing the wall, bent over at the waist so his head was level with his hips, with both hands flat against the wall, while another player (or multiple players) threw the ball at his ass three times. If all three throws hit his ass, or if he deviated from the required position, or if either of his hands left the wall, then he was out of the game. But if one of the three throws missed him, he remained in the game (unless he did one of the forbidden things).

Buck-Buck
Equipment Needed: None
Description: A variation of "Johnny On the Pony." The main difference was that rather than climbing onto the other team's backs, we had to vault onto their backs from a running start, using our hands to push off the rump of the most rearward person and vaulting forward.

The game was won when the opposing team's chain collapsed under the vaulting team's weight. If that didn't happen by the time the entire team had vaulted, then the captain of the vaulting team had to hold up a number of fingers and say, "Buck buck, buck buck, tell me how many fingers up." If the captain of the team on the bottom guessed correctly, then they won. If not, then the vaulting team won.

Ring-O-Levio / Cocolevio / Kick the Can
Equipment Needed: A tin can for Kick The Can, otherwise none.
Description: Ring-o-levio and Cocolevio are the same game except for the venue. When played in a smaller, enclosed area like a playground or sandlot, the term Ring-O-Levio was used. When played in an unenclosed venue (a whole block, neighborhood or larger), it was called Cocolevio.

In either case, it was basically a team tag game in which each side had a "jail" in which opposing players were held once they were tagged. The jail could be the area behind a chalk line, or it could be a bench, stoop, etc. The jail was not allowed to be guarded: There was a line drawn on the ground a few feet from the jail, and players could not get closer to their own team's jail than that line. Guarding (or "babysitting") violations resulted in all the prisoners going free.

As a team tag game, both sides were both "It" and the pursuing team simultaneously. Each team pursued the other until all of the opposing members were in jail. Games could last for hours, whole days, or even span several days.

In the Brooklyn form of the game, a "tag" was not just a touch. It required an embrace (although we wouldn't have called it that... heh) that actually stopped the opposing player's movement, along with reciting the chant, "Cocolevio 1-2-3, 1-2-3, No Breakways!" The tagged player was then a prisoner; and if he dared escape, thus violating the "No Breakways!" rule, his team would lose the round.

Intentionally bringing an opposing player to the ground was called "roughing" and was not allowed unless both teams had agreed before the game that it would be played "with roughing," in which case grounding the opponent was required (along with the chant). Usually we'd play "with roughing" if we were on a dirt or grass lot, and with "no roughing" if playing on cement / pavement. Intentionally roughing an opponent during a "no-roughing" game resulted in the tagged person going free, and the tagger going to jail. (Pretending to have been intentionally roughed resulted in being called a sissy, fairy, crybaby, or ( *gasp* ) a GIRL, but nothing more.)

Once in jail, prisoners could be freed by being touched by any member of their own team who managed to reach the jail without being tagged himself. Only a simple touch was required to free someone, not an embrace.

By prior agreement, "electricity" could also be allowed, in which case all the prisoners could form a chain reaching out into the area of play as long as the anchor person had his feet in the jail (or his butt on the step, bench, stoop, etc. if that was the jail), and a player only had to touch any person in the chain to free them all. But if the chain got broken, any prisoner outside of the jail who was "disconnected" would be considered to have escaped, and his team would lose the game (or the round, in a multi-round game).

Kick The Can was a variation of Ring-O-Livio / Cocolivia in which only one side was "It" at a time, and there was an empty tin can standing somewhere near the center of the playing area, guarded by a member of the pursuing team. If someone from the "It" team managed to kick the can out of the area of play, all of the prisoners were released, and the teams switched roles.

To this end, members of the "It" team would often try to distract the person guarding the can, while another team member snuck in from behind and kicked the can. There was no limit to how far the "guard" could wander from the can, and he was also a pursuer who could tag and jail an "It" player. But the farther he wandered from the can, the more risk there was that an opposing team member could kick it; so there were some elements of actual strategy to the game.

The game was over when either side, as pursuer, managed to jail all of the opposing team's players. In reality, this seldom happened; and the games would go on for hours on end until it got dark, and would end with no winner or loser.

Skelzies or Skulls
Equipment Needed: A big piece of chalk and some bottle caps
Description: This was a fairly complex game with about a bazillion variations. But the basic version went something like this...

A square court consisting of 13 boxes was drawn on the ground, with the number 13 in the middle, and the rest at various points on the perimeter. The numbers 1 through 4 were the corners; I forget where the others were, but there was a set design. There also was a skull drawn around the 13 box, in which only killers were allowed; and there was a "Skelzies Line" a few feet back from the square from which we took our first plays.

The basic idea of the game was to start at the Skelzies line and flick your bottle cap into the boxes from 1 to 13, and then back down again, without your bottle cap landing in the Skull area. You had only one flick for each advance. If you didn't progress to the next number in one flick, you had to wait until the next turn and try again. If your bottle cap stopped in the Skull, then you had to start all over again from the Skelzies Line.

The goal was to go from 1 to 13, and then back down from 13 to 1, and then from 1 to 13 in one shot, without having your cap stop in the skull. Once you got to 13 the second time, only then could you declare yourself a "killer" and safely play from within the skull. You goal at that point is to knock other players out of the game by hitting their bottle caps with your own bottle cap three times, which puts them out of the game.

Skelzies was an elimination game, and the last remaining player in a game was the winner. Few games actually made it that far, however. Skelzies was more of a game that two or three kids might play to pass time until enough other kids showed up to do something more exciting, like stickball or Cocolevio.

-Rich

 

[Banjo33]

Those sound like fun games!

We played Asses Up; however, we just called it "wall ball." Our variation was that the ball needn't bounce before you could catch it.

 

[RJM62]

They were a lot of fun, and they all cost, at most, a quarter.

As you might imagine, a lot of balls wound up lost on roofs and in the postage-stamp sized backyards behind some of the houses. Once in a while we'd sneak up to the roofs or into the backyards and collect all the balls, or some kindly adult who had reason to be there would collect them for us.

Old spaldeens that weren't too "dead" could sometimes be revived by boiling them in water (or so we thought, at least). Our mothers didn't consider it at all odd to find us boiling spaldeens in the kitchen.

-Rich

 

[Everskyward]

Wow. You have a good memory.

 

[Geico266]

Too much running around by today's standards. All that liability stuff ya know.

You would need goggles, helmets, knee pads, specialized clothing.

 

[Bill Watson]

That's great stuff.

I grew up in Pittsburgh where we had versions of most of those games but with our own jargon. The funny thing is that we were aware that what we called a plain 'ol rubber ball was 'officially' known as a Spaldeen in NYC. There were more than a few discussions comparing the lesser qualities of our rubber balls compared to what a real Spaldeen was, as if it mattered. Actually the Spaldeen probably was better than what we used until we discovered a source of balls used for racquetball. They were blue but much closer to what I later learned was a Spaldeen, a very nice ball indeed.

Things were different then mainly because we were outside wandering the neighborhood most of the time. There were dangers but it was just part of growing up in slightly tougher world.

 

[RJM62]

Wow. You have a good memory.

Maybe not as good as I thought. I realized this morning that I left out few details that people who didn't play the games wouldn't know, and without which some of the games make less sense. I've dutifully corrected them in the interest of history.

Too much running around by today's standards. All that liability stuff ya know.

You would need goggles, helmets, knee pads, specialized clothing.

And all that touching! It would never be allowed today. someone might get... touched! And throwing balls at each others' asses? Absolutely unacceptable. It encourages violence, you know.

That's great stuff.

I grew up in Pittsburgh where we had versions of most of those games but with our own jargon. The funny thing is that we were aware that what we called a plain 'ol rubber ball was 'officially' known as a Spaldeen in NYC. There were more than a few discussions comparing the lesser qualities of our rubber balls compared to what a real Spaldeen was, as if it mattered. Actually the Spaldeen probably was better than what we used until we discovered a source of balls used for racquetball. They were blue but much closer to what I later learned was a Spaldeen, a very nice ball indeed.

Things were different then mainly because we were outside wandering the neighborhood most of the time. There were dangers but it was just part of growing up in slightly tougher world.

In Brooklyn, we were vaguely aware that there were other cities where children also played similar games, but that was pretty much the extent of our awareness. Brooklyn and New York City were big enough and diverse enough places that they pretty much defined our concept of the world.

When we felt adventurous, we'd scrounge up subway fare and take secret trips to Manhattan or Queens. Either was sufficiently different from Brooklyn that it was an adventure. Manhattan was a frenetic place that assaulted us with confusion the moment we stepped out of the subway. Queens was a surreally pastoral and orderly place where the toilets at playgrounds actually worked, and people waited in single-file lines at bus stops.

It didn't feel like a rougher world, though. Objectively, the crime rate back then was much higher than it is nowadays, but no one I knew ever fell victim to bogeymen. Society was more risk-tolerant, however, and more realistic about kids' need to start learning how to navigate life for themselves at an early age.

-Rich

 

[alfadog]

Skelzies or Skulls
Equipment Needed: A big piece of chalk and some bottle caps
Description: This was a fairly complex game with about a bazillion variations. But the basic version went something like this...

A square court consisting of 13 boxes was drawn on the ground, with the number 13 in the middle, and the rest at various points on the perimeter. The numbers 1 through 4 were the corners; I forget where the others were, but there was a set design. There also was a skull drawn around the 13 box, in which only killers were allowed; and there was a "Skelzies Line" a few feet back from the square from which we took our first plays.

The basic idea of the game was to start at the Skelzies line and flick your bottle cap into the boxes from 1 to 13, and then back down again, without your bottle cap landing in the Skull area. You had only one flick for each advance. If you didn't progress to the next number in one flick, you had to wait until the next turn and try again. If your bottle cap stopped in the Skull, then you had to start all over again from the Skelzies Line.

The goal was to go from 1 to 13, and then back down from 13 to 1, and then from 1 to 13 in one shot, without having your cap stop in the skull. Once you got to 13 the second time, only then could you declare yourself a "killer" and safely play from within the skull. You goal at that point is to knock other players out of the game by hitting their bottle caps with your own bottle cap three times, which puts them out of the game.

Skelzies was an elimination game, and the last remaining player in a game was the winner. Few games actually made it that far, however. Skelzies was more of a game that two or three kids might play to pass time until enough other kids showed up to do something more exciting, like stickball or Cocolevio.

-Rich

When I saw this post and started reading it, I hoped you might get to this one. I was born in Manhattan and lived there until unhappy events broke up my family when I was six and I landed in an orphanage on Staten Island. Yea, we were pretty much "lower working class" also.

I definitely remember this game from when I was five and six. It was played in the street, as were most of the games we played. We would fill the caps with melted wax from candles to give them weight and make them better shooters.

Here is a weird game my older brother and I invented maybe. My dad was super in the building (tenement) as a side job so we lived down in the basement. We, of course, had access to the boiler room which was a maze of pipes. We found this big spool of thread somewhere. This was like 5 lbs at least and on a wooden spindle. We would play "spiders web" where we would take turns throwing the spool over the pipes and around fixtures to create a spiders web. I don't remember any rules but I do remember throwing the spool over a pipe and it coming down hard on my brother's head and opening one hell of a gash.

Thanks

 

[flyingron]

Spaldeens weren't too common around, but we'd play kickball (essentially a rolling pitch baseball) with almost any ball that was volleyball size or larger (usually one of these cheap multicolor kids balls or if we were at somewhere (school, parks) with proper equipment, the red rubber (ADAA approved) "playground" balls. Not too many cars parked in the street in our neighborhood so we used the expansion joints on the street as base markers (or got some chalk out).

We a basketball (or something approximating it), we'd play Four Horses (a local variant on HORSE). There were hoops around, sometimes over ground that was either soft (grass) or tilted to make actual basketball games a bit dodgey.

 

[RJM62]

When I saw this post and started reading it, I hoped you might get to this one. I was born in Manhattan and lived there until unhappy events broke up my family when I was six and I landed in an orphanage on Staten Island. Yea, we were pretty much "lower working class" also.

I definitely remember this game from when I was five and six. It was played in the street, as were most of the games we played. We would fill the caps with melted wax from candles to give them weight and make them better shooters.

Yes! I'd forgotten that detail!

Here is a weird game my older brother and I invented maybe. My dad was super in the building (tenement) as a side job so we lived down in the basement. We, of course, had access to the boiler room which was a maze of pipes. We found this big spool of thread somewhere. This was like 5 lbs at least and on a wooden spindle. We would play "spiders web" where we would take turns throwing the spool over the pipes and around fixtures to create a spiders web. I don't remember any rules but I do remember throwing the spool over a pipe and it coming down hard on my brother's head and opening one hell of a gash.

Your dad must have loved that particular game -- not.

-Rich

 

[RJM62]

Spaldeens weren't too common around, but we'd play kickball (essentially a rolling pitch baseball) with almost any ball that was volleyball size or larger (usually one of these cheap multicolor kids balls or if we were at somewhere (school, parks) with proper equipment, the red rubber (ADAA approved) "playground" balls. Not too many cars parked in the street in our neighborhood so we used the expansion joints on the street as base markers (or got some chalk out).

We a basketball (or something approximating it), we'd play Four Horses (a local variant on HORSE). There were hoops around, sometimes over ground that was either soft (grass) or tilted to make actual basketball games a bit dodgey.

We played kickball in the schoolyard with big rubber balls that the nuns provided. I doubt they were approved by anyone other than the nuns. They were the same balls we used to play dodgeball, which was another game we only played in school, for whatever reason.

I don't remember "HORSE," nor anything resembling it. How did that work?

-Rich

 

[alfadog]

Your dad must have loved that particular game -- not.

-Rich

Yea, that enters into the unhappy bits. Our dad would beat us randomly and say "that was for nothing, now go do something". So we were covered for pretty much anything we did

 

[EdFred]

We played kickball in the schoolyard with big rubber balls that the nuns provided. I doubt they were approved by anyone other than the nuns. They were the same balls we used to play dodgeball, which was another game we only played in school, for whatever reason.

I don't remember "HORSE," nor anything resembling it. How did that work?

-Rich

HORSE is the longer version of PIG.

Requirements: Basketball hoop, and a ball.
Number of players: Minimum two, no maximum - usually max of 5, because with 6, you could play 3 on 3.

Player A shoots from a spot he designates, and also says what type of shot it needs to be. Could be "off handed," granny, normal, backwards, anything. If A misses his shot, nothing happens and Player B shoot then assumes the role player A just had, and this is repeated until someone finally makes a shot.

If A (or any subsequent player) makes the shot of their choosing, and the next player in line misses, the player that missed the shot, gets an H. And the next player after the one that missed gets to take a shot of his choosing. So, if A makes a shot, and B makes the shot, and C misses. C gets an "H" and player D gets to take the shot of his choosing. If all players make the shot, nothing happens, and player A chooses his shot again. As a player misses shots made by players ahead of him, he keeps getting assigned letters. H-O-R-S-E. When you've spelled HORSE (or PIG), you're out. When all other players have spelled HORSE, the single person remaining who hasn't spelled it wins.


We always played the ever so politically correct "Smear the Queer." Best played with 8-12 players, it used a dodge ball or football, and someone would throw the ball into the air as high as they could to start the game. After bouncing, or it could be caught, someone would grab the ball, and basically run with it for as long as they could before being tackled. Once tackled, they would give up the ball and the person nearest would pick the ball up and see how long they could go without getting tackled.

Avoiding picking up the ball, or giving the ball up before getting tackled subjected the person to a pile-on where said person was pursued, detained, and the entire group of kids would pile on the offending player. Basically it was better to pick up the ball, and get tackled by one or two kids, versus getting piled on by 12.

Winning the game was subjective - it usually came down to a vote at the end, on which player had the best moves or who avoided being tackled the longest. Although sometimes, the winner was the person who made the most tackles.

 

[Bill Watson]

On the less athletic side, every year there would be a kind of season for spinning tops and another for yo-yos.

It was seasonal in the sense that like magic, the corner store would start carrying tops and we would dutifully buy them. They came in a variety of shapes and sizes, but always the same shapes and sizes. We played games with them that revolved around 'pegging' each others tops. Done properly, you could split and ruin your friends best top.

At some other time, like magic, the corner store would start carrying Yo-Yos. There were about 5 basic types, each at a different price. Wood at the bottom, plastic Imperials at the top. There we'd just try to out do each other with the various 'walk the dog' and 'cradle the baby' type tricks.

In both cases, the toys would disappear from the shelves until next 'season'. Each year I wondered who and what controlled this stuff.... was it done on purpose? Why? What is this marketing thing?

Ah, the mysteries of growing up.

 

[Everskyward]

Maybe not as good as I thought. I realized this morning that I left out few details that people who didn't play the games wouldn't know, and without which some of the games make less sense. I've dutifully corrected them in the interest of history.

I find it interesting that you can remember things from your childhood with such clarity and detail while I can't. This is a trait that some people have. Of course I moved away from the place I grew up and, for all practical purposes never went back.

 

[eman1200]

I recall jumping rooftops in Brooklyn as a kid....and THAT WAS the game we were playing. "who's got balls", the game should'a been called.

 

[X3 Skier]

The only one mentioned we played was HORSE but only when there were not enough for 3 on 3. We did however, hunt rats in the storm sewers with BB Guns.

Another favorite was The Race. A bunch of us teenagers in a bar (legal age then was 18 for Beer and lots had fake ID's) would start a heated argument about who could beat who in a foot race. A sucker would be selected to be the judge and sent about a half mile down the road out of sight of the bar to witness the finish. As soon as they left, drinking would commence again until the judge returned whence the two competitors would feign injury or other excuse and with luck, the judge could be sent down the road another time after a few days "recovery". The judge pool was quickly depleted until new faces appeared in the local. If the judge was a good sport about it, he could become a future "competitor".

Cheers

 

[RJM62]

Yea, that enters into the unhappy bits. Our dad would beat us randomly and say "that was for nothing, now go do something". So we were covered for pretty much anything we did

Sorry about the reminder...

-Rich

 

[alfadog]

Sorry about the reminder...

-Rich

Nah, no worries. He reformed and I forgave him. Had a lot of good years with him as an adult.

 

[John221us]

In the suburbs of SoCal, there weren't too many organized games, other than tag football (which was most fun in the rain). We played marbles, a bit, but mostly rode around on our bikes, made jumps for them, etc. I had a hoop on the garage, so we did play horse and maybe some one on one. We moved to a more rural area, when I was 10 and then we ran around in the orange groves and had orange fights.

 

[RJM62]

HORSE is the longer version of PIG.

Requirements: Basketball hoop, and a ball.
Number of players: Minimum two, no maximum - usually max of 5, because with 6, you could play 3 on 3.

Player A shoots from a spot he designates, and also says what type of shot it needs to be. Could be "off handed," granny, normal, backwards, anything. If A misses his shot, nothing happens and Player B shoot then assumes the role player A just had, and this is repeated until someone finally makes a shot.

If A (or any subsequent player) makes the shot of their choosing, and the next player in line misses, the player that missed the shot, gets an H. And the next player after the one that missed gets to take a shot of his choosing. So, if A makes a shot, and B makes the shot, and C misses. C gets an "H" and player D gets to take the shot of his choosing. If all players make the shot, nothing happens, and player A chooses his shot again. As a player misses shots made by players ahead of him, he keeps getting assigned letters. H-O-R-S-E. When you've spelled HORSE (or PIG), you're out. When all other players have spelled HORSE, the single person remaining who hasn't spelled it wins.


We always played the ever so politically correct "Smear the Queer." Best played with 8-12 players, it used a dodge ball or football, and someone would throw the ball into the air as high as they could to start the game. After bouncing, or it could be caught, someone would grab the ball, and basically run with it for as long as they could before being tackled. Once tackled, they would give up the ball and the person nearest would pick the ball up and see how long they could go without getting tackled.

Avoiding picking up the ball, or giving the ball up before getting tackled subjected the person to a pile-on where said person was pursued, detained, and the entire group of kids would pile on the offending player. Basically it was better to pick up the ball, and get tackled by one or two kids, versus getting piled on by 12.

Winning the game was subjective - it usually came down to a vote at the end, on which player had the best moves or who avoided being tackled the longest. Although sometimes, the winner was the person who made the most tackles.

Thanks for the explanations, Ed. The second game sounds vaguely familiar, actually (although not by that name). But it could also have been some impromptu tackle game that we made up.

-Rich

 

[denverpilot]

I remember a few of those, Rich. We were in less populated suburbs most of my childhood so it was a bit of a treat to find enough kids to run one of those bigger team games. And visiting family was even more rural.

I remember a lot of wandering around on bikes (and crashing them) for miles and miles and taking the .22 rifle(s) along and plinking at pop cans, fence posts, maybe an occasional prairie dog. (We were more interested in inanimate things but prairie dogs are just useless around here and do a lot of damage.)

If we could mix in blowing things up with fireworks that was always "cool".

At certain relative's houses, dirt motorcycles and go karts were allowed on dirt roads. No helmets no nothin'. Just go for a ride. Push the thing a mile when you stupidly ran out of gas. ;-)

A lot of hide and go seek with wildly mixed age groups of whoever was outside that day and the mud and or tackle football on any available grass large enough to host it. Lots of five or six person messing around with baseballs and softballs.

And from age 12 on up, quite a bit of computer time and dad taught a bit if basic electronics from those old Radio Shack electronics learning lab things. Neighbor in Jr High had a large Ham Radio station and he'd invite the whole gang over to ogle and throw in a little Ohm's law

 

[gkainz]

We played "feed the horses" and "shovel the stalls" and "fix fences" and all those fun ranch games.

Occasionally a pine cone war or snowball fight would break out among the sibs and cousins.

Lots of exploring on foot, horseback, bikes, jeep or snowmobiles with rifles, shotguns or bows, hunting and/or fishing...

 

[denverpilot]

We played "feed the horses" and "shovel the stalls" and "fix fences" and all those fun ranch games.

My dad was Navy. That game was called "paint everything in sight and paint it again", at his house. If not paint, stain, or coat, or otherwise brush liquid on all exposed surfaces.

(I know you'll get a chuckle out of that. And my inability to not assess every outdoor surface for peeling or cracking coatings, without even realizing that I'm doing it.)

 

[SCCutler]

My dad played stickball, told me of it often. He grew up in Queens (Kew Gardens), born 1917.

 

[jesse]

I grew up in the rural midwest. Outside of school there was rarely enough kids in one place at one time to run any sort of larger team based game. About the only real games I can remember is the standard HORSE/PIG stuff. I guess there was some army stuff.

In the city (city population being between 500 to 3,000 people):
We mostly rode our bikes around (without helmets, some parents would try, but you would indeed be made fun of for wearing one). We'd make jumps and whatnot. There was a fair quantity of video game playing in my era.

In the country:
Dirtbikes. Fishing. Anything with a motor. Guns. Work. Explosives. From up into teams and have the teams hunt each other over a square mile or so. It was pretty subjective as to who shot who but that didn't really matter.

 

[ARFlyer]

I grew up in the country and went to a private school in the city. So my "neighborhood" games were all done at school.

Parking lot soccer: All the normal rules applied. The goals were normally between two basketball goals and a landscaping wall. These goals could be 20' or more wide. So it made the goalie's job quite difficult. When I transferred to a public school the game always ended up as the 5th graders tackling the 4th graders.

Slide: The big kid playground had a fort slide built out of wood. The slide was about 15' tall and had a ramp that went down to a 5' tall "tower". The game could only be played after a rain because it consisted of sliding down said ramp. The rules were that you had to stay put after you came to a stop until everyone went. However the tower had no rails. So this means if you slid to fast or were the first poor guy you went flying off. The game normally ended with someone hurt or a pile of kids.

It was a sad day when the school replaced the "dangerous" playground with a "kid safe" one. Only the kid safe playground would burn the **** out of you because of the plastic.

At home I ended up playing in the woods or the creek.

 

[TMetzinger]

On my one lane country road we spray painted three lines and made a tennis court.

I remember buck buck and other games growing up in CT. And Cosby made a great routine out of buck-buck with Fat Albert as the last player for his side.

 

[RJM62]

On my one lane country road we spray painted three lines and made a tennis court.

I remember buck buck and other games growing up in CT. And Cosby made a great routine out of buck-buck with Fat Albert as the last player for his side.

We used to put a short kid as the last person in the chain, and a tall kid right in front of him, to make it more difficult to get altitude by vaulting off the short kid's rump.

The rules were that the next kid in line on the vaulting team had to be off and running by the time the kid in front of him vaulted onto the chain, and if any kid on the vaulting team fell off the chain (or if his foot even touched the ground), the vaulting team forfeited. So by using a short kid behind a tall kid as the last two kids in the chain, it increased the chances of a vaulter having trouble vaulting on to the tall kid by pushing off the short kid's rump, which would cause problems for the players coming after him.

That was part of the beauty of these games. There was "strategy," of a sort -- and each generation of kids thought they'd figured it out all by themselves. We all thought we were geniuses, lol.

-Rich

 

[denverpilot]

I forgot playground stuff.

Favorites were seeing how many people we could back up on a slide (practice for future interstate highway traffic jams little did we know), and seeing who couldn't hang on to the merry go round at high speeds and would get launched the furthest. Heh.

 

[TMetzinger]

I forgot playground stuff.

Favorites were seeing how many people we could back up on a slide (practice for future interstate highway traffic jams little did we know), and seeing who couldn't hang on to the merry go round at high speeds and would get launched the furthest. Heh.

On concrete or asphalt too!

 

[Skylane81E]

We had smear the queer, (not that we knew what it meant) horse, tackle football, and the ever popular build forts in the woods

 

[denverpilot]

On concrete or asphalt too!

Oh yes. Definitely. Most of our playgrounds were covered in rocks. Jagged small rocks. Not round soft gravel.

We would seek out the nicer gravel covered ones for launching ourselves from the swing sets into.

 

[Jim_CAK]

HORSE is the longer version of PIG.

Requirements: Basketball hoop, and a ball.
Number of players: Minimum two, no maximum - usually max of 5, because with 6, you could play 3 on 3.

Player A shoots from a spot he designates, and also says what type of shot it needs to be. Could be "off handed," granny, normal, backwards, anything. If A misses his shot, nothing happens and Player B shoot then assumes the role player A just had, and this is repeated until someone finally makes a shot.

If A (or any subsequent player) makes the shot of their choosing, and the next player in line misses, the player that missed the shot, gets an H. And the next player after the one that missed gets to take a shot of his choosing. So, if A makes a shot, and B makes the shot, and C misses. C gets an "H" and player D gets to take the shot of his choosing. If all players make the shot, nothing happens, and player A chooses his shot again. As a player misses shots made by players ahead of him, he keeps getting assigned letters. H-O-R-S-E. When you've spelled HORSE (or PIG), you're out. When all other players have spelled HORSE, the single person remaining who hasn't spelled it wins.


We always played the ever so politically correct "Smear the Queer." Best played with 8-12 players, it used a dodge ball or football, and someone would throw the ball into the air as high as they could to start the game. After bouncing, or it could be caught, someone would grab the ball, and basically run with it for as long as they could before being tackled. Once tackled, they would give up the ball and the person nearest would pick the ball up and see how long they could go without getting tackled.

Avoiding picking up the ball, or giving the ball up before getting tackled subjected the person to a pile-on where said person was pursued, detained, and the entire group of kids would pile on the offending player. Basically it was better to pick up the ball, and get tackled by one or two kids, versus getting piled on by 12.

Winning the game was subjective - it usually came down to a vote at the end, on which player had the best moves or who avoided being tackled the longest. Although sometimes, the winner was the person who made the most tackles.

Are you sure you did not grow up in Ohio?
It sure sounds like the games we were playing as a kid.

 

[FormerHangie]

On my one lane country road we spray painted three lines and made a tennis court.

I remember buck buck and other games growing up in CT. And Cosby made a great routine out of buck-buck with Fat Albert as the last player for his side.

We picked up on Buck Buck after hearing some of Cosby's routines. IIRC it died out pretty quick once guys figured out that jumping up and then landing on the pile would collapse it pretty quickly.

Living in the suburbs it was hard to get enough kids together for much in the way of organized games. We'd occasionally get up enough for a softball game, but it was easier to play kickball with a depleted fielding staff. We also played a variation of dodge ball called murderball. Also, four square, lots of four square. The organized sports available to preteens were swimming, baseball, and flag football. On our playground at school, we used to do what we called chicken fights. Two guys would start at the opposite side of a set of monkey bars that were more or less like a ladder suspended parallel to the ground. The goal was to knock the other guy off. I perfected a technique where I would swing forward and grab the other guy around the waist with my legs. Then I would walk my legs up as high as possible, then put my feet on the other guy's shoulders. Then I'd put all my weight onto my legs, and thus the other guy was now supporting himself and me with his arms. Since there was nothing he could do to retaliate at that point, he'd have to let go.

Nowadays, most of the kids activities are organized and at a much higher level than what we did. My girls used to get involved in pickup kickball and volleyball games, but that's about it, all the other sports and performing arts are organized. Anyone who says kids today are removed from risk hasn't seen a gymnastics meet or a cheer competition. It's a good thing that those are done with adult supervision, the injury potential is high.

 

[momalley]

I grew up in Queens and have played all but Kings, Sculls and Buck-Buck

 

[Artimas]

I also grew up in NY. Does anyone remember "Potsy"? It was the NY term for hopscotch. The game was called Potsy. The small item tossed onto the court was called "the potsy" and was often a bottlecap. It was typically played by girls. We guys would then play "bottlecaps" on the unused hopscotch court. This was a version of skully.

I played most of the other games also. We played Wall Ball with Spaldeens.

Good memories!

 

[patrick wentworth]

Tall grass fights. Two groups would meet in a field, choose up sides and pull the tall grass clumps out of the soft dirt twist off all but the foot or so above the dirt clod..... and launch ... and launch till all the grass was pulled up.

Kind of like a snowball fight but we had no snow in SoCal. Made do with what we had we did.

Lots of home made go karts and two wheel scooters from lawn mowers. Learned a lot about machines that way. Coke can rockets from cherry bombs on the top of a hole in the cans ... all before the fun was banned in California.

Tin can plinking with bb guns and 22s -- now we would be called terrorists

Fishing in the ocean, body surfing in the cold cold water ...
We had good times with cheap toys and tools.