Category Archives: Queens

ANYONE HERE REMEMBER THE…

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ANYONE HERE REMEMBER THE YARD? RIGHT BY THE 4 TOWERS IN QUEENS BETWEEN MARATHON PARKWAY AND LILLTE NECK PARKWAY? THE TOWN WAS CALLED DEEPDALE/BEECH HILLS. TO THIS DAY WE STILL FIGHT ABOUT WHICH SPOT HAD THE BEST LOOKING BABES. FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO DON’T KNOW THERE IS A WEBSITE. IT’S AT WWW.BEECHHILLS.HOMESTEAD.COM/ IF ANYONE REMEMBERS THE YARD TAKE A LOOK AT THE WEBSITE. YOU WILL SEE FACES YOU HAVEN’T SEEN IN 40 YEARS. DENNIS GORME

My brother, Clyde, and I…

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My brother, Clyde, and I grew up in Queens, where, like all our peers, we played several versions of stickball. We are now 67 and 64 years old, and while I now live in Georgia and he on Long Island, every so often we get together to play a 2-man game with tennis balls and a manufactured bat. Our latest game was just a month ago against a wall at an elementary school near his house. He is still a good pitcher and we both still hit well, and since the baseball adage “good pitching will always beat good hitting” is true in stickball, too, he won the game. It was great.

I grew up in the Pomonok…

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I grew up in the Pomonok project across from Queens College in the ’50’s and early ’60’s. Where we were Pensies were rarely available, though known of. Any of you remember that spaldeens varied somewhat in pressure. I’d go through the box and find the hardest ones I could. They could be punched further, hit further, but their principle advantage was in handball, if you were over six feet. It was an equalizer when playing with a short guy with better skills. In close play, a low hit would send it caroming over his reach. By the way Geoff, you sure could split a spaldeen with a broom stick or those slightly larger stickball bats that were sold in some places. A baseball bat compresses the ball too much and creates a greater area of contact making a split less likely. We used to turn the splits inside out and throw them. they moved like maniacal frisbees and were almost impossible to catch. Any of you remember three box baseball, a pavement game we played when it was just too hot and humid to play anything else?

I can’t believe I didn’t…

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I can’t believe I didn’t see anyone here from Queensbridge projects! The neighborhood next to the 3 smoke stacks of Con-Edison in Queens. We had 6 parks right in our neighborhood. We moved to RI in 1973 (I was 12) and they never heard of Spaldeens, never played double-dutch, never saw a stickball bat and had never eaten a knish! I went to this website because I’m going to teach my 10 year old daughter’s girl scout group here in California how to play all the games I knew, thanks for all the help in remembering, especially SPUD, I forgot that one!

Always thought Skelly was…

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Always thought Skelly was a Whitestone, Queens game. Throughout the ’60’s I played just about every morning with my friends at PS 209, Clearview’s neighborhood elementary school. Great fun! We all bickered over whether candle wax or melted crayons was better fill for our bottle caps (soda bottles).

I grew up in Floral Park…

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I grew up in Floral Park Queens during the 70’s and played a ton of stoop ball with my pals from P.S. 115. We played with baseball rules, with singles, doubles, triples and home runs determined by the distance an uncaught ball flew before hitting the ground. Bunting wasn’t allowed so the ball had to at least make it past the guy throwing it at the stoop. We had a bit of a lawn in front of our house, and that was all singles territory. Anywhere in the area of the sidewalk was a double. Into the street was a triple and making it across to the other side of the street was a home run. If the ball was caught, or went foul (rebounded off to the sides or up into the door above the stoop) that was an out. Three outs and you changed who was up. You could play with only two people or as many as you liked, but we usually never allowed more than three people in the field at a time, or it was too easy to catch. Pointers were not worth any special amount of points, as in some variations, but considering it was the best way to get distance, you always tried for one. My special “Submarine Sidearm” throw, as I was fond of calling it when I was 8, was very good at getting pointers!

Hi, I am not sure if this…

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Hi, I am not sure if this game I played in the in the mid 70’s was made up in my neighborhood or not, but it was a form of stickball, we called it SCOONY. We played in a bocce ball court, a pitcher, catcher , second baseman all were inside the bocce court. A centerfielder stood outside the bocce court wall. and the first and third basemen stood just outside the court lined up with their base. The pitcher pitched the ball on one bounce, spining the ball if he wanted. We played with rules of baseball, bunting, stealing, tagging up but when you tried to steal, you could not take a lead, and could only steal AFTER the catcher caught the ball. Another rule was that the batter MUST bat his opposite hand, (right must bat left)and for a bunt to be legal, it had to pass a FOUL line drawn into the sand before the game started. This game was very entertaining and we played it for hours. We used a pinky or a spaldeen, and sometimes a tennis ball ( if we couldnt buy a spaldeen). For a bat we used either a broom handle or a store bought stick ball bat.If anyone else played this game, please email me at muns0n015 [at] aol [dot] com and tell me about. I grew up in Long Island City ( QUEENS )

I remember “Chinese Jumprope”…

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I remember “Chinese Jumprope” that I used to play in the Bronx. When I moved to Queens, I didn’t see it around. We used rubber bands (elastics would do) and looped them together to form one long rope that we tied the ends together. Two people would stand about five feet apart with the “rope” around thier ankles to form a large box. The jumper would put one foot in and out of the rope and then slip the foot under one end and bring it over the other side (in a way like cat’s cradle if you think of it, but you came back to the starting point) We used to sing/song “in out over one, in out over two”.. etc. There were variations as you kept going without making a mistake like turning and taking turns with each foot and the rope would also go higher too.

I grew up in Woodside, Queens…

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I grew up in Woodside, Queens in the seventies and loved Red Rover, Red Rover, Red Light, Green Light, etc. I remember the boys playing stick ball,etc. Being a girl, we did alot of the jumprope games/rhymes, and also more “girlie” steet games. I recall one being called “germany”, where you needed four concrete “squares” and would have to step for “one”, hop for “two”, Skip for “three”, etc. I think it went up to nine, and you couldn’t touch any “lines” and couldn’t step into “germany”, or the third box. Sound familiar to anyone? WE also played “girls, girls, out” This one used six boxes and had different categories in each box like, colors, girls names, boys names, etc. You would have to hop into the box twice saying “girls, girls out”, then go over each box saying a different girl’s name twice, then go into the next category and do boys names, etc. If anyone has more info on these games, please share. Love this website – it’s so nostalgic!