Figure 1.--This 1904 photograph shows four boys about 6-9myears old playing war along the Harlem waterfront. Harlem at the time was a tony New York neighborhood. The boys have carefully set up a brick fort and playing war with crude wooden guns. Shipping warehouses and a sail boat are visible in the background. The photograph is a silver gelatin print.

Play acting was once popular among boys. The themes were largelt the food huys against the bad guys. This could be cops and robbers, war, or cowboys and Indians. An associated activity is bulding a fort as part of the game. And of course the game ibvolved guns for shooting at each other. The war game dependence on the most recent war. When I was a kid it was World War II. We are not sure just when all of this began. We suspect in American in began even before the Tevolutiin, but we have not seen actual refeences until the 19th century. We see kids playing with toy guns or imaginary or crude guns. But guns were an important pat of the game. This was not directed play, buy just waht the kids (almost entirely boys) did when they got together in unsoperbised circumstamces. We think this is much less common today. This is because children are much more suprvised today thanwas the case as recentky as he 1960s. Amf moms don't like war and war games. And they have largely disarmed boys. Modern boys are much less likely to have toy guns and especially BB-guns.

Created: 7:17 AM 5/17/2019
Last updated: 6:33 AM 9/30/2020