When The Name of the Game Was Fun
By Margery McCurdy Plummer

Spring is almost here. All you soccer moms and team coaches take note. Church co-ed vollyball leagues are announcing sign ups, and soon little league baseball will be starting with the little guys wearing their miniature uniforms.

Until I got into organized sports near junior high, I spent years in the most disorganized, unorganized attempts at various ball sports that one can imagine.

Can you believe that we had no coaches, no umpires, a random number of players on a team, (as many as could be rounded up.) There were no bleachers, no folding chairs, and guess what? There were no spectators with the exception of players and maybe a passerby who paused to watch for a minute, then move on to more important things.

There was really no age limit for players, but it was expected that they be “fairly young”. Teams were usually selected by a more “mature”, sensible fair minded person who had a knack for “evening up”. That is, not allowing all the inexperienced little guys with limited athletic talent on one team, but more or less chose a mix of good and bad and in-between.

These leader type were boys one could tell would develop persons of enviable character with high morals and great athletic prowess, something like our present day Peyton Manning that many people admire.
Our sports knew no seasons, as such, but games were played as weather permitted and players were available.
Our most popular sport was baseball, with basketball running a very close second, and touch football not as popular as the others, the reason being that since it was played by girls as well as boys, and the game had to be more pass, run and “touch”, or hit rather than the regular rough and tumble, tackle and get mean of a regular football game, it had to be “adapted.”

We played our baseball games on the good sized lot (probably now called church campus) behind the old, old, frame Baptist church on Portland Road where it turned into Tyree Springs Road. We followed the rules as best we knew how on this field with home plate, first, second, and third bases marked by good sized squares of wood that would stay in place most of the time. There was no designated number of inning, the game ending when daylight started to fade or a voice from some nearby house could be heard calling, “Supper”!

Basketball, which was to become my favorite sport, got off to a slow start, because we had no gymnasium, and an outdoor court was usually a flat part of someone’s yard without much grass, or a wide driveway. We played “regulation” somewhat, but most of the activity centered around “dribbling” down the court and shooting the ball at, or hopefully into, a basket mounted on the upper part of a garage. I’ve been known on occasion to dribble down our living room floor and shoot at an invisible spot above the door facing. This was done when no other family members were around to see or tell. I don’t think we had any idea of how to count score in this game.

I like the way sports are organized now, within limits. Think how much time and effort goes into the preparation for the various sports each season. Without it, chaos would reign. I’m glad, though, that we had those carefree years before we had to settle down to serious living, those days when light hearted fun was the name of the game.