Category Archives: Locales
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We’re about to begin the 1999 Brooklyn Stickball Classic – We’re at Driggs and N 7th, the border of Greenpoint and Williamsburg. About 40 or so players have shown up and are taking their first swings. Spalding is giving out balls & tee sirts and the Daily News is setting up the “officials booth.” Butch Yung of the Guardian Angels, one of the event coordiators has asked the captains of the competing teams to come register for the event. Registration fees are $50 money goes to the Police Athletic League (PAL) Street Games Program. Team players receive official 1999 shirts. Teams get bats. John Campi of the Daily News just officially started the event. The first competition will be the “long ball.” $5 to register – money again going to PAL. If you hit it 200 feet you get a Daily News 2 sewer pin. Today’s winner gets a gift certificate from Modells. The winner at the end of the citywide competition will get a free trip to Puerto Rico.
I grew up in the South Bronx…
I grew up in the South Bronx in the 60’s and we used to call this game “skellzies”. We spent many hot summer days avoiding the cars while we laid on the ground trying to calculate each shot carefully. We used whatever we could get our hands on be it soda bottle caps and liquor bottle caps which seemed to be plentiful on some streets back then. We also used to trim the top rim of the soda bottles by gradually scraping it on the sidewalk curb. These glass pieces worked great because they seemed to glide such a long distance instead of the cumbersome caps we used to use. Yet, “skellzies” also had a killer instinct quality to the game. You see the only way to stop someone from beating you, if you could help it, was to blast their pieces into kingdom come. This was easily acomplished when someone in my class brought a bottle opener to school and proceeded to fiddle around with the metal bottom glide of a school desk. When he succeeded, we ran out of the classroom, out of the building and followed him around the block. He immediately sat on the curb and pulled out of his pocket a popsicle stick. Then he began to dig deep into the tar on the street. He filled his metal glide piece with the tar. Once completed, he challenged us to a game of “skellzies”. We all gathered together in anticipation of what this “new” challenger piece could do. As we began play, it became evident what this metal glide piece could do. It could slide long distances like the glass pieces yet it was durable. But most of all it was dominating. He sent all of the challenger’s pieces into kingdom come. They went flying across the street and under parked cars. As for the glass pieces, you guessed it! They were smashed into smithereens. I mean it was ugly!!! The replacement bottle caps did not fare well either. The “Dominator” was born!!! Of course, you all know the rest of the story. Shortly after the “Dominator victory”, all the desks at school had no metal glide bottoms. This caused such a scandal that the whole school had detention for a week. Ahhh, but it was worth it!! The sight of game pieces flying all about as we challenged our neighbors in “skeelzies” and coming away with the spoils of war, was and still is a glorious memory today. Thanks for bringing your website to us all.
Any Brooklyn girls recall…
i played with a stickball…
i played with a stickball bat i used to buy at “welcome” store on johnson avenue in riverdale circa 1960-61. used tennis ball also. i bought one years later on the “island”- i was married and my son was maybe 12-he’s now 27-and had it until a few years ago. i think some statinary stores may still sell them.
off 164th and the concourse,…
off 164th and the concourse, in the mid-late 50’s, we played mostly 1 bounce “fungo” (self hit) stickball with a spaldeen. hits dtermined by distance. in riverdale from 1960-69, we played with a shaved tennis ball (which curved, threw screwballs) against a chalk box in the ps 24 schoolyard. sometimes had an outfielder. that was MY game. also played bench ball, punch ball, stoop ball, and curb ball (back in the old neighborhood-the concourse). and box ball.
I would go to coney island…
I remember how hard it was…
I remember how hard it was to walk on the boardwalk without shoes when you would go to the concession stands..ouch…ouch…hot ..hot..we would watch the fireworks on tuesday night by Bay 13…we would sit on the boardwalk and watch the people and ride in the wicker chairs. When I was older we would makeout under the boardwalk..hahaha…oh what fun.
we played 3 box and 4 box…
we played 3 box and 4 box baseball on davidson ave in the bronx in the late 60’s both games have been described pretty accuratly we used to straddle the corners of the box in front of you to get a better reach into the box but tried not to put ur foot in the box hey harvey remember me we played 3 box all the time and i used to get u bus passes at clinton!!! lol those were the days of innocence jim
I grew up on the corner…
I grew up on the corner of 166th Street and Sheridan Avenue, across the street from P.S. 90. (90 Bronx, the best and finest, hail to dear 90). I wouldn’t trade anything for being brought up there until I went in the service in 1951, but I wouldn’t move back for anything as well. 35 years in South Carolina has spoiled me but good.