"MARBLES" ARE A BOY'S BEST FRIEND

Here's a short recollection of my marble playing days in the years before 1939. 02/07/2016

“MARBLES” ARE A BOY’S BEST FRIEND

My boyhood athletic skills included roller skating and playing two versions of baseball adapted to city streets. Modesty prevents me from including my other amazing boyhood talent, flipping baseball cards. However, my ability to play one particular game of marbles made me known everywhere . . . within a range of two city blocks.

Every true red, white and blue American boy of my generation played marbles. My opponents always turned purple with rage and green with envy when they saw me show up with my yellow and black agate. You must agree, we made a colorful crowd.

This is it, my marbles arena. In my days, it was unfenced. The street sign stood straight.

My pals and I considered marbles a competitive sport. Each player tried to win as many marbles as possible from the other contestants. We played a variety of marbles games on a small patch of dirt located at the corner of 8^th and Hudson, part of the campus of Stevens Institute of Technology.  

The game at which I excelled required each player to place their “at risk” marbles within the perimeter of a small square or a rectangle scratched out on this hallowed ground. From behind a line, each player then “bowled” a marble toward a scooped out hole about the size of a golf cup. The proximity of your marble to this hole established the order in which players took turns shooting at the “at risk” marbles from a distance of about five feet. You could keep the marble you hit out provided your “shooter” marble did not remain in the box. You shot until you missed. The next closest shooter would then take his turn. The terrain, hardly billiard-table smooth, made it difficult to hit the target marbles, especially when only a few remained.

From time to time, certain unethical playmates would shoot with a steel ball bearing instead of a standard marble. We discouraged this practice by shouting naughty words at the culprit.

Everyone tried to use his best or favorite marble with which to shoot. When the stakes were high and I faced a very good opponent, I used my precious special marble, one that allowed me to “gun” down my opponent while “shooting” my way to victory.

To this day, this particular marble remains in my mind’s eye, this “Rosebud” friend of mine, my beautiful yellow and black companion, colors that appealed to me then and to this day.

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