Jumping rope, Red Rover, Hide and seek.
 

Did you play in the street, the alley or on a vacant lot??? Tell us about playing when you were a kid.

Do you remember the rhymes we said when we jumped rope? Did you choose up teams for stick ball? I was always the last chosen. I know why now. How many skinned knees did you get? I was too chicken to fall out of a tree.

I played roly poly on the sidewalk. Never played hop scotch. Of course we played football, baseball, and basketball also. We played stoop ball where you throw a rubber ball against porch stairs and try to hit the point of the stairs. Another game we played was stick ball where a rectangle was drawn on the school building wall and you would bat using a broom handle and the pitcher would throw a ball and try to hit the rectangle for a strike. When we played we pretended to be a major league team and had to bat either right or left depending on the major league lineup.

John

I didn't do the jump rope thing,...that was for girls! We dug fox holes, played army, blew up our GI Joe's with firecrackers, built tree houses in the woods, played in the stream until we had leaches hanging off our legs,..... walked the railroad tracks picking elderberries, then we'd sell them to the neighbor ladies. We rode mini bikes, made go carts and actually coasted them down the same street that cars went on,...(lucky we didn't get killed).....all in the great State of Ohio! :icon_wink:

In addition to playing all the games that John mentioned, we also played johnnie on the pony, box baseball, chinese handball, off the wall (where one person throws a spaulding or pensie pinkie against the wall and his opponent tries to catch it on the fly), touch football in the street (go out to the chevy and cut left), and a strange game called three feet off to germany. I grew up in Brooklyn, Queens, and New Hyde Park, LI.

Oh, ...and I forgot "Kick the Can" ! A type of after dark hide and seek where the can set in the yard was "home base" ....

yup.

Had to yell "all ee all ee in free" when it was time to gather everyone back.

Have not heard of some of your games. Names are interesting...

but Graytop. GIJoe was not even a gleam in Mr. Mattel's eye when I was a kid. My boy cousin had a metal army jeep toy that he plowed through the sandbox with.

I remember playing tetherball and "four square" when I was in elementary school.

Used to play "army" in a sandbox with some friends - we made homemade rubber band 'guns' and would shoot at the other person's toy soldiers in the sandbox. A hit counted as a point.

Also made a homemade skateboard out of an old disassembled "shoe skate" (the metal ones that clamped to your shoes.....with the 'key' to tighten them!) Nailed the two halves to the bottom of a board and away I went. Lots of fun til I hit a big crack in a downhill sidewalk - crashed and burned big time! Still have the scar on my elbow.......

Bill :)

If I tried to list everything I did as a kid I would ruin several years of therapy, but I'll try to list a few.

Besides the usual items like baseball, football, basketball and walking the railroad tracks, l can remember using a sandbox and building castles where we would hide a king (stick) within what we built. There were two castles facing each other built by two different teams. With a medium-small stone we would then take turns tossing the stone at each others castle trying to bury their king. The first to bury the others king was the winner.

I also played golf using a bow and arrow. I'd place a hoola hoop on the ground, move a distance away as far as safely possible, then I'd see how many shots it took to make it into the hoop! Never joined the PAGA (Pro-Archery Golf Association) though!

Anybody ever shoot baseball cards against a wall, closest to wall took all the cards? That was fun... mostly when you were winning!

We lived where the Erie Canal began off of the Hudson River and the locks had what's called spillways to serve the movement of water in and out of the locks. We used to like going skinny dipping in the spillway, and being young the only worry we had when doing so is that the eels in the water might go looking for a meal of worms... if ya know what I mean!

I loved climbing trees & jungle bars back then, the higher the better; should have been born a monkey. I had three favorite trees to climb and sit in for give or take about 20 minutes when things were slow. One of the trees, overlooking the Hudson River, was my most favorite.

And yes Gracie, I too was frequently picked last, but that was only when I was the only one playing... usually! :1rotfl:

You made this post while I was preparing my post. Funny that we came up with the sandbox thing at the same time. Anyway, did you call truces occasionally to have a popcorn snack then resume? :icon_wink:

Too bad we didn't know we both did this back then. It would have been fun to travel to each others venue for competition! :shocked:
:popcorn:

In the streets. In addition, we played stick ball when a pitch was thrown on a bounce to the hitter. We used a broom handle with the Spaulding ball. We should have had shares in Spaulding as we hit many balls into area's where they were unretrievable especially the sewers. I slid into second base on concrete. How that for dedication and or stupidity?

Also Johnny Rides the Pony buit not too many times a it got a little rough. Hide and seek.

Football was go long or cut to the left towards the Buick and I'll throw it you you.

There was also a punch ball league that was played in the back of P.S 18.
A Spaulding ball that was throw one a bounce above the shoulder and was punched. It was interesting as this school had many windows and crevices where crazy bounces would result.

We had a building where we used the point with the other building 30 feet away. One time, someone really hit the point with the Spaulding really good and it went to the third floor through an open window that was opened slightly. We thought we lost the ball as a usually mean Jenny C. would never give it back to us. We started to scatter and then Jenny open the window and was laughing. She threw the ball back to us and explained the ball came through the window and bounce into her husbands bowl of salad. First and only time I remember her laughing. Obviously, she thought it was hysterical. :)

During recess at school we would play Hop Scotch and of course jump rope to....MI crooked letter, crooked letter, i, crooked letter, crooked letter, i, hump-back, hump-back, i......ie. Mississippi and can't remember the name of the 'song' but it went like 1st floor stop....2nd floor stop.... At home in the neighborhood,we would play hide n' seek and have many softball games in the middle of the street, using cars as the bases.....that is until the street lights went on.....then we all went home. Oh such good memories. Wonder where all the kids are that I played with at school and at home?

And for girls games
 

we played games Dodge ball, alleys, double dutch and sardines. This last one was always fun to play with the boys as we had to get into cramped spaces. The main trouble with it was that if it were played in a large space and it got dark, sometimes one of us would fall asleep and not know the game was over! Then we would have to have a search party and yell for the missing kid. Then as we grew older the hoola hoop came along and that was another era of all different games!

I find it sooooo sad that kids don't get out and get dirty. I think some of the problems labeled 'ADD and ADHD' can be contributed to kids not getting rid of all the energy that comes with being a kid. It's great that everywhere you look (not just TV) you see nicely manicured lawns but when we were kids, you played on the lawn...the folks didn't care because the hadn't spent tons of money making it perfect. There is no place to get dirty, we built forts out of wood stacked behind the garage, played softball, converted an old shed into our 'fort'. Now parents are afraid to let the kids out of their sight...I absolutely HATE it when my grandkids spend their entire days playing video games and texting. They really, really do not know how to play outside, if they do play, it's an organized sport, not a bad thing but just not the same. So sad :(

We played Red Light Green Light, Duck Duck Goose and Simon Says as younger kids. As I got older we played Army and I was Sgt. Saunders from the TV show Combat. What other TV shows influenced the way you played as kids?

.....but I wasn't born until 1958,...I grew up in the 60's with GI Joe, and an army green Tonka jeep, one that was still made out of metal with rubber wheels! :)