iTopSpin
Current Posts => Latest Spin => Topic started by: gunhawk7 on September 08, 2011, 11:45:08 PM
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(Admin note: I reconstructed this thread from part of the lost thread)
On the history and popularity of top spinning; i'm 65 years old and was a kid living in New York City during the early to middle 1950's and I can testify to the fact that top spinning was alive and very popular during that era. Boys carried tops around like they carried pea shooters and spaldeens. However I never saw anyone do tricks with them. As i've described in other threads, we "dueled" with the tops rather than did tricks. In our games we tried to split our opponent's tops. We never played that game where two tops are thrown simultaneously into a circle and the last one still spinning in the circle won. We did "odds and evens" to see who's top was the target and tried to throw and hit it while it was spinning. A top that missed and didn't spin became the target top. If a top was thrown and missed but still spun it could be "scooped" and dropped on the target top for a second try, so the only trick that we learned was the "scoop". "Hammering" a top down and having it still spin is a skill in itself. I've seen tops thrown with such force that they bounced into the air and still came down spinning.
Regarding top tricks in the 1950's; I didn't know that it was *possible* to do tricks with a top other than the "scoop". I've never even seen anyone even *try* a "boomerang" as in our games there would have been no use for that.
Regarding Yo-Yo's; there seemed to be a big push for them on TV in the 50's. Many of the children's shows, like "Wonderama", featured Yo-Yo experts doing tricks, and Duncan advertised Yo-Yo's on TV as well. That, of course, got many of us to try them. But after a few throws I got bored and didn't look at mine again. I rarely saw anyone use one in my neighborhood. I can remember a kid at school "walking the dog" with one, but that's about all. I never saw a top advertised or used on TV.
I think that a good part of the reason that kids in my area didn't maintain a strong interest in Yo-Yo's is because it's a solitary sport. You practice alone and unless there's someone else in your neighborhood that you can compete with and show learned tricks to you'd putting in a lot of effort to learn a skill set that would be useless as compared to learning to play basketball, or stick ball, or even "dueling" with tops. However, we *did* all try Yo-Yo's because of the push on TV, so I have to guess that if tops were heavily advertised there would at least be some inducement to buy one, even if it was just an impulse.
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Gunhawk, now that I am age 71 and from the mid-west (Cincinnati, OH) I had slightly different experiences. I saw only pump tops until middle age. The boys played yo-yos, marbles, and mumbly peg (pocket knife games). The girls played jump rope, jacks, and paddle ball. When I started doing the Science of Spin presentation Dale had to start from "this is a top" and this is how you wind it. In the late 40s early 50s in our area Yo-yos were only popular after the Duncan guys taught us how to do the next trick on the contest list. We would practice, compete, teach each other what we could, then reach our level of competence and move on to something else. As far as I can remember the Duncan guys never played tops in our area, it was all about the yo-yo. So skill toys seem to me to be very geographical, only in areas where there was/is someone skilled enough to teach. Now everyone has access where ever they live. It is still better if you have someone close who can explain what you are doing wrong or would be better if ... but more info is available everywhere.
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Quote from: Dick Stohr on Today at 02:37:50 PM
Gunhawk, now that I am age 71 and from the mid-west (Cincinnati, OH) I had slightly different experiences. I saw only pump tops until middle age. The boys played yo-yos, marbles, and mumbly peg (pocket knife games). As far as I can remember the Duncan guys never played tops in our area, it was all about the yo-yo. So skill toys seem to me to be very geographical, only in areas where there was/is someone skilled enough to teach.
Pardon me for snipping your post a bit.
Nobody that I knew played with marbles. We played a variation of "Mumbly Peg" called "stretch" where your opponent threw his knife and you had to stretch one leg and foot to touch the stuck knife while keeping one foot in it's previous position. If you could do that it was your turn to throw. It's kind of hard to describe, but it's a bit like "twister", but with knives. LOL
I agree that the toys that the "street" toys that we played with were probably determined by where we lived. I got a PM from Larry D., a member of this group, from The Bronx in New York City who directed me to one of his previous posts which read almost exactly like mine! The "dueling" tops game that we both played was identical in both Manhattan and The Bronx. I didn't ask him (yet) but I believe that a history of "dueling" in our neighborhoods probably goes back to our grandparents and one of the main reasons would be the easy access to tops. I'm sure that in his neighborhood, like mine, there were small "candy stores" that were actually more like newstand/cigarette/magazine stores that also sold candy, soda and cheap toys like spaldeens, water pistols, pea shooters, caps for cap pistols, balsa gliders and ten cent tops. So as would happen every summer someone would bring out his top and before long all of the boys brought out their own favorites or bought new ones right there on the same street, and the "dueling" would begin. You certainly wouldn't have to go very far to find a top as *all* of the candy stores stocked them. Beside the primary red, blue, yellow, green etc. colors there was also a red, tan and blue one that I liked very much. And as Larry mentioned, we rarely saw a round tipped top. We always assumed that they were for girls. LOL
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The version of top battle that my friend played in Harlem was called "crack top". They put the victim top in one of the holes of a floor drain, not spinning, and the others would take turns throwing at it to crack it. She was the first person I talked to who not only told me that she used to battle tops when she was little, but had actually seen a top cracked with her own eyes. Up to that point everyone I spoke to about battles had only heard that somebody else had broken one. That is the main reason we came up with the Ultimate Battletop Championship; to see if skilled players could actually break a top. Of course, if Alan would just make junkier tops, maybe we could break them.
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Quote from: MarkHayward on Today at 09:37:00 PM
The version of top battle that my friend played in Harlem was called "crack top". They put the victim top in one of the holes of a floor drain, not spinning, and the others would take turns throwing at it to crack it. She was the first person I talked to who not only told me that she used to battle tops when she was little, but had actually seen a top cracked with her own eyes. Up to that point everyone I spoke to about battles had only heard that somebody else had broken one. That is the main reason we came up with the Ultimate Battletop Championship; to see if skilled players could actually break a top. Of course, if Alan would just make junkier tops, maybe we could break them.
I never personally split one, and it was very rare to do it as we didn't make it easier by sticking the target top into a hole in a manhole cover. With the top held steady like that I have to think that it would be easier to split. Since our target tops were spinning upright they would "give" when hit, so it took a walloping direct hit to split one. Chipped tops were much more common, but a top that had a sizeable chunk knocked out of it and rendered useless was considered "split".
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Gunhawk, our alternate version of "Stretch" was to start with our feet spread apart and the knife thrown to stick between them. You could choose which foot to move so that the space was still as big as possible, but when the space got too small to have confidence in the thrower you lost. If he got your foot, he lost. And we survived! Now a pocket knife on the school playground gets you expelled.
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Dick, we played the same knife game at school; however, we called it "chicken".....if the non-thrower moved, even a tiny bit, he lost..... :o
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I grew up playing "mumbly peg" or "stretch" as it has been called here. I am not sure what we called it but I think I remember something about "chicken" or "dare" connected with it. This was a big favorite with the older Boy Scouts in the early 1960's but eventually it was outlawed at camps when too many kids were getting injured. I was never hurt but I do remember being really scared about what some of those older scouts would do with a knife. They would throw hard and not be afraid of getting close to your feet. Come to think of it, I do remember some of my old tennis shoes getting slits in them from near misses!!!
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we didn't make it easier by sticking the target top into a hole in a manhole cover
This comment brings to mind the discussion suggesting that some old tops, those without a collar around the tip, actually split from the inside. The tip of the "chump's" top would ram upward rather than the attacker's tip splitting from above. If suspended in a manhole cover, the top would be supported by the body, making it much more difficult to split.
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OK......this is hilarious. I am riding in the hearse with the funeral director. We are laughing about some of the stories told at the funeral. The guy who died had a bunch of brothers and they used to do a whole bunch of things growing up including shooting bb guns at matches and trying to get them to light. The conversation eventually turned to where he went to mortuary school. Get this.....he trained in San Antonio and has eaten at the Tip Top Cafe! In fact, he and his family and friends ate there almost every Friday night. I told him I had a Tip Top hat and shirt and he said..."really?"
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Is the right adjective hilarious or creepy? :-\ Well, I guess I am laughing more than anything else.
Next time you visit and we go back to the Tip Top Cafe, please, don't ask the owner about the mortuary school! :P
It IS a pretty amazing coincidence!
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I guess what I have found over the years is that people who go to mortuary school are human too, just like us pastors. Sadly, I am the only pastor or funeral director that I know who spins tops. At least now I can say I know one pastor (me) and one funeral director (my friend from today) who have gone to the Tip Top Cafe.....and I can't wait to go back! Actually, my funeral director friend said he couldn't wait to go back, too!!!
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we didn't make it easier by sticking the target top into a hole in a manhole cover
This comment brings to mind the discussion suggesting that some old tops, those without a collar around the tip, actually split from the inside. The tip of the "chump's" top would ram upward rather than the attacker's tip splitting from above. If suspended in a manhole cover, the top would be supported by the body, making it much more difficult to split.
I never saw a top without a collar.
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Another almost 71 year old response.
I grew up under the top spinning of Jim Schreiber. He is posted on this site several times. By today's standards, his tricks are primitive as are mine. Jim encourage top spinning in Bible Camp and that's where I learned.
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String tricks with spinning tops, including regenerations, where popular in some parts of Chicago, at least as early as the 1910's. That's where Jim Schreiber learned.
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Just ran across a video of some 'kids' playing tops--not really battling but still nice to see.
Spinning Tops @ Woodstock 69's 40th Reunion (http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=VUMAg4KJyrs#)
From the description: ... had made wooden tops for us like the ones we spun as children at Woodstock in Mussoorie. It was great fun to spin then at our class's 40th reunion in Eugene, Oregon in July of 2009.
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Very nice to see these Americans can still throw tops (even boomerangs and trapeze mounts) 40 years after they left school . . . in INDIA!!!! I was pretty surprised when I searched for this school, Woodstock in Mussoorie, and found it is a Christian international school close to the Himalayas (www.woodstockschool.in (http://www.woodstockschool.in)). But if you look at the keywords for the video, one is in fact India.
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OK, this is an amazing "small world" story.
My wife Dorothy's dad Jack remarried years ago after Dorothy's mom passed away. He and his wife Cate, both educators/college administrators, lived and worked for three years at the Woodstock School in Mussoorie during the 1990's. Cate actually grew up there as her father, a missionary, worked for many years in northern India and the kids went to the Woodstock School. It's highly entertaining to watch this 6' tall blond woman break into fluent Hindi from time to time. Dorothy travelled to India to visit them, but alas, I was never able to go.
Better still, the second thrower in the video is Cate's brother John!!!!! I actually gave him one of my earliest wood tops.....
Amazing!
Also, during their time in India on one of their visits home, Jack, knowing my passion for tops, brought me a classic Indian top like the ones they're using....
Wow......just wow.
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Wow, that's so cool Eric. :D Fantastic video find John, I really enjoyed it.
One of the parents from our school said that she saw (for the first time ever, this past summer) kids playing with tops when she went back to her native home in Hungary for a visit. She had only ever seen kids at our little Berkeley Ca school play with tops before this. She said that the tops were all the rage in Hungary.
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What a great video John! Thanks. It is really a pleasure to watch!
Every time I bring tops to the office the folks I work with, especially from India, get misty-eyed reflecting back to their childhoods. They pick up the tops, hands trembling in the excitement of their memories, a smile on their face, and start spinning. What great fun!
Eric, what an incredible coincidence for you!
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Wow Eric! And that is my third "wow" from this video (the video itself and then finding they were classmates in India were the other ones).
Now you have to give us the inside info: did they play tops because that was popular with kids their age in that part of India, or was this a special activity of the school? You said their parents were missionaries: could there be a Schreiber connection here?
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Thanks for the memories, Eric. I agree with all the others......wow!!!
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The question about the Schreiber connection. Highly unlikely. In all my years of being around Jim S. I never heard of any connection with India. He was mostly mid-west. I'm sure I would have heard of a mission work in India if there had been one.
Neat to see thess top spinners from way back. :D
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The father of one of my wife's dear co-workers died. We are at her friend's house after the funeral for a meal. Everything was typical with lots of good food, sharing old stories and more. Then suddenly a brother-in-law of the deceased pulled out an old top and started spinning it. His grandkids came running. He pulled out another for them. Then another. And then another. It was wild!!! Spinners were everywhere and soon I joined in. Mike Prieto was his name and he grew up on the east side of Chicago, in Indiana near the harbor. He threw down with an overhand motion and said that is the way they did it growing up, in order to destroy the other tops. His stories were very similar to all the other stories of the 50's and early 60's except when the tops got dull. The "scissor man" who came through to sharpen the family scissors would sharpen dull points for one cent, which was a deal since a new top was three cents. And if you needed a new string, it would cost you two pennies.
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Wow, Mike. You live a charmed life.
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Wow! What are the chances? Great story!
Did the tops he had at the meal have spike tips or tricking tips?
Yeah, all indicates that Chicago was a hot spot of top spinning.
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They were those old spike tips.....the pop rivet style tips. He said he saw them on the internet and bought them for his grandkids. They were having a good time with them even if they were not getting a lot of spinners.
I have been looking up about the scissors man. Seemed like an interesting job and I think of Dick Stohr and his work where he lives. But, to be honest, it has been hard to work through information about Edward Scissorshand and the person who, in anger, cut another guy's private off with scissors! Yow!!! Anyway, we have a lot of old timers around here and I think they could tell me some good stories about the scissors man in our area.
You are right, Renee, I have lived a charmed life in many ways and especially with some of the many good folks in the top spinning community. I look forward to another exciting series of adventures up in Cleveland!
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Could this be your traveling knife sharpener?
https://patch.com/illinois/westernsprings/do-you-remember-scissors-grinder
(https://i.ibb.co/T40q4Dz/knife-sharpening-cart.jpg) (https://ibb.co/T40q4Dz)
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Very interesting. I knew nothing about this old time job. Thanks for your info. It linked me to another picture of someone with that kind of equipment. I find this to be really fascinating and they used it for top related activities.....to sharpen the point for a better kill!!!
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I am younger than you, Mike, but in my youth back in Uruguay there were still itinerant knife sharpeners hollering their services. I do remember my mother once getting some knife sharpened. But sharpening tops is great new information! 8)
I suspected this job still existed in parts of Latin America and a search in youtube in fact found one from Mexico. The guy uses an electric grinder (I guess the customer needs to provide a socket to plug it) instead of the traditional sharpeners powered by pedal or hand crank: youtube.com/watch?v=F_enJaMi8Qg (http://youtube.com/watch?v=F_enJaMi8Qg)