What a feast. From the Marshmaloow Cookies between two vanilla wafers, to the great Hero Sands at the local Deli in Brooklyn. To the eggnogs at the local candy stores. To the great Hot Dogs at Ebbetts’s field. To the great Knishes. And to GOOD HUMOR trucks, and the Bungalow Bar trucks… And to Stoop Ball and all that… What a pleasure growing up in Brooklyn!!! Love the Stoties hear!!! Reference ID: B
It’s amazing to find that stoopball as played on Long Island, NY in the early 60’s was the same game being played in Chicago etc. The only difference was we had fielders, so you could try and catch the ball on a fly and get the “batter” out. Since we were little kids, it didn’t happen too often!
We called it “stairball”. Much like “pinners” described by Brian. Catch it on the fly for an out. If it bounced before you caught it, you had to throw at the stairs and catch the rebound on the fly or it was a single. If it landed in the street, it was a double if it was on the near side, triple if on the far side, and a homer if it landed clear across the street. We had both one-on-one and two-on-two rules. We were fantasy baseball pioneers – we had rosters of pro players, and we traded them, kept stats, had playoffs, and at least two world series per summer.
We played a game like that but we called it “pinners”. Basically it was baseball,if the ball landed before the sidewalk that passed the front of the house it was a base hit, if the ball landed on the sidewalk it was a double, if the ball landed in the grass between the sidewalk and the street it was a triple if the ball landed in the street it was a homerun. the foul lines were the width of the steps. also if you catch the ball on a fly and you throw the ball and hit “only the second step” it was a double play.
I used to live on Madison Street in Ridgewood. We used to play stickball all the time. Even though I was a girl, they let me play. I only got one stitch in my entire life. I got it by waiting to get up to bat playing stickball. The guy before me hit the ball and threw the bat. The bat flew into my head just above my eye. Ouch! Did that hurt! When we first moved out to LI, we continued playing stickball at first, but then we started playing softball and kickball in the street. But since we had a stoop, we could still play stoopball.
Stoop Ball — As played in the early ’60’s on Ave Z and E. 13 Street. Our stoop was a brick structure 5 steps high. We had to stand at least 2 “boxes” (lines in the cement) back. You threw the ball at the stoop, and had to catch the bouce-back in no more than one bounce. Catching it on one bounce was 5 points, with no bounce, 10 points. If the ball shot back, straight at you because it hit the tip of the step, and you caught it “on the fly”, it was 50 points. — Very hard to do. You continued your turn until you couldn’t catch it on the first bounce. Usually 100 points won the game.
I was thinking of the games we used to play with a Spaldeen. There were games for only one person up through a full baseball team. As I remember them they were: 1 Person Catch with yourself- throw the ball up and catch it. Practicing your pitching against a box on the wall Throwing the ball against the wall to see how high you could throw it. On the roof was the ultimate Throwing the ball off the wall (or stoop) and practicing your catching ability. 2 Persons Box Baseball Hit the penny. Stickball Catch American Handball, paddle ball, etc. Off the wall Stoopball 3 Persons Monkey in the middle Running Bases Salugi (?) or keep away Chinese handball Larger Groups Punchball Slapball I’m sure there are more. But for 25 cents, nothing could beat thatbeautiful pink ball with the word Spaulding stamped on it. We didn’t need our parents making schedules, driving us all over the place. Just us and a little ball, and we were in heaven for hours. Mark Podhorzer Now of Atlanta GA, but in my heart always from Brooklyn