In the 30's and early 40's while we were still in elementary school, play had certain forms, cycles and strictures.
Since cars were far fewer within even the outer boroughs of NYC we played in the street quite a bit. Stickball was popular, using a broom handle cut to length as a bat, and either a tennis ball or a smaller, pink, hollow rubber ball known as a 'Spaulding'. Getting a good whack on either style ball with the skinny bat was not easy.
In a game of War, also played in the middle of the street, any number of kids could play. Each kid was assigned the name of a country and stood in a loose circle around whoever was 'It'. He would hurl a rubber ball straight down against the pavement while shouting "I declare war against ... " and name a country. Everyone ran away except for the one with the named country who had to dash to the center and retrieve the ball. As soon as he got it everyone had to freeze and he had a choice of whom to throw the ball at. Whoever was hit became the next 'It'.
We had no organized sports and made do with whatever equipment pieces were available in our homes: a football, a baseball glove, a softball, a bat. We also used any plain wall of a building to play handball.
Games seemed to have their own seasons, as well. At some magical moment, it was 'marbles." Everyone got his cache of glassy globes and dug a hole in the ground by rotating the heel of his shoe in the soil. There were a variety of games, all requiring that, in turn, a marble was launched by flicking it from your hand with the thumb trying to get into the hole or knocking another's marble there, thereby winning that marble. A bag of marbles would grow or shrink as the season went on.
But then one day, it would become mumbledy-peg season and everyone brought out his penknife to flick in the air trying to get it to stick in the soil.
Next, cards! Not a poker deck, but baseball cards which were acquired over time by buying the variety of bubble gum (one cent each) which was accompanied by a single card showing the picture and statistics of a popular professional player. The cards were carried in your pocket, ever-ready for a game, which often consisted of one boy flipping his card, end-over-end, to land on its head or tail. The competitor then flipped his card. If it landed the same way he won and kept the other one. If not, he lost his card. Oh, the excitement!
We had NO clue what girls of that time played at. They were another species and we didn't mix. And, then a few years later ... ah, but that's a different world entirely, isn't it?
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