Category Archives: Other Spaldeen games
Grew up on Wilson Street…
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Grew up on Wilson Street and Lee Avenue in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. Attended Boys High School. Most friends went to Eastern District or Seward Park High School. Most of us played punch ball with a “baby line.” three steps to Germany, Johnny on the Pony, Chinese handball and box ball. We read and traded comic books. “Action Comics, Detective Comics, Marvel, King Feature Comics and read the comics in the newspapers. Dick Tracy, (my favorite), Smiling Jack with Fat Stuff losing a button to a ubiquitous chicken who followed him everywhere. Saturday matines for 5 cents we saw a chapter (Tim Tyler’s Luck or Flash Gordon) the Paramount News (Monkees do the craaaaziest things,)two or three features, a cartoon and sometimes a door prize announced from the stage. I could go on forever and include the radio programs for which we raced home from the school playground to hear.
In East Cambridge MA. we…
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In East Cambridge MA. we called it “Outs”. There was a mini-slide in the middle of the stairs with the o/o bounds marked on either side by a driveway/curb. Like anonymous above, only “errors ” caused a dispute on runner advances. A homerun was rare but doable- down the driveway. Hit the window in right field foul territory and the scary old man’d start swearing and rapping on the window… We used the same location for street hockey before there was enough of us to take over the BBall courts.
PENNY PINSKEY. This or something…
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PENNY PINSKEY. This or something close to this was the brand name of the substitute ball of choice when the candy store was out of Spaldings. It wasn’t as firm or live as a Spalding, but it beat nothing–and heaven forbid we’d use a tennis ball, so heavy and dead compared to a pink ball.
Like “stairball” and “pinners,”…
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Like “stairball” and “pinners,” our baseball-style version of stoopball was called “off-the-point.” We played it on the granite step in front of the girls room of the parkhouse on Van Cortlandt Park South in the Bronx. There were always negotiations and clarifications on the rules, such as which fence posts were the foul posts, before the game began. Hitting the sweet spot–the corner of the granite step–with a new Spalding resulted in that “ping” sound that sent a rush through us and usually meant a hit.
thanks butirfly and lorib…
they were called skip- its!…
In response to a request…
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In response to a request for the ‘weirdest’ skelly cap, I’d like to add that in Brooklyn, NY during the early ’70s we used the rounded metal feet from the bottom of Catholic school desks. Once we found how well they slid across the street pavement, many of the desks at school (St. Simon and Jude) were imbalanced. It quickly got out of hand and became an unfair advantage for those who were using the standard bottle cap with melted crayons (as the feet were much heavier). I’ll also note that most boards were made in the street with chalk (don’t remember any standard dimensions), but one year we carved a more permanent one into the tar with pocket knives. Thanks for the memories. Makes me think back on other street games like Johnny on the Pony, Ring-o-Leavy-o, Coco-Leavy-o, Slap ball, Box ball, the other game played on a box ball setup (2 adjacent sidewalk boxes) where you had to flip and/or move the popsickle stick or coin -sorry I can’t remember the name…
Hi Valerie, Since…
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Hi Valerie, Since you were in Sunset Park, did you guys ever go out on Thanksgiving, in the Halloween Theme, and go door to door asking “Anything for Thanksgiving” .. We did that.. Dressed up like Hobo’s trying to get more candy.. Sounds stupid, but true. I never heard of anyone else doing that.. Except, Tom above.. 🙂