I remember the 60’s back in the claremont project in the bronx every kid had a pocket bulge(spalding). we climb on old factory rooftops or the freight tracks and find balls that some seemed to be as old as fifty yrs. being poor I remember taking them home and boilng them in hot water to try to return a bounce to them. It worked but nothing like a spankin new spalding.
Hi all…I’m new to posting to this site, however I have looked at it many times already…I absolutely love it! It’s as if I stepped back into the past..which is a good thing… I loved my childhood and growing up in Brooklyn and wouldn’t trade it for the world…Oh the endless hours of playing skully..the tedious task of melting those crayons and getting a wonderful blend of colors in those bottle caps! To be a kid again!
I think that was the name of the concrete park we used to hang out in early 70’s It was around Eastern Parkway and broadway We played handball there,and There was a softball Field there. Pretty rough place Sometimes I remember going with a friend to see our girls play softball against another team and as we were entering the park a gang of ruff’s aproached us to jump us I think, after a brief encounter the girls team came running over with there bats in hand and squashed the problem Those brooklyn girls are alright
Sneaking on the train Did anyone ever sneak on the train growing up in east new york brooklyn we would sneak on the train jumping the turnstyle climbing up the outside of the elevated lines. dangerous” crossing the tracks to get to the other side one day my brother fell through and just grabbed on before he fell to the street below, crazy
I used to play in East New York, Brooklyn I taught MY sons the game Many years later, from about 5 Years old they loved it and so did the neighborhood kids, In this age of video games it would be great to see a comeback of the game, I hear that someone patented a simular game for indoors on a baord. If anyone has any info,I would like to hear more of it LennyM
Soft Pinkies rule. One of my most savored kid memories was walking back to school at lunch in NE Philly having just stole () a Pinkie from the corner candy store. Throwing a fresh pinkie at a nice tall brick wall on a spring afternoon is heaven on earth. Does anyone remember playing SUICIDE – a game with a sponge (Pinkie) ball against a wall (school wall). You would throw the ball to hit 1st the ground then 2nd the wall so the ball launched high in the air. If you caught it, the person who threw it must touch the wall b4 you get to peg him with the ball. If you try and catch someone else’s ball and miss, its your bum on the line. Still don’t know why it was called suicide. Likely many names for this game. Chris
I remember playing stickball in Brooklyn in the 30’s and early forties. Ave. T between East 28th and East 29th Streets. Seems that there were a lot fewer cars on the street then. One bounce to home plate. The business of the distance, sewer covers, in my opinion, was determined by the length of the stick (broom handle). The longer it was, the further it went. With a long enough stick, if you caught the ball at the end of the stick, it never came down. I believe the first thing in orbit was a Spalding. Not only spin on the ball when pitched but squezzing the Spalding (bastardized to spaldeen I guess) with the middle finger gave the pitcher what might be considered a “knuckler” which, no one ever knew which way it would bounce when it hit the ground. If you grew up in Brooklyn before the war, there was bound to be some stickball somewhere in your back ground.