FVC Perspectives: Playground memories

Kids these days just don’t have the same playground experiences they did in the past.

In this month’s FVC Perspectives call-out, we asked readers to share their memories of playgrounds and parks, and talk about some of the mishaps and near-misses they endured as children.

Most respondents talked wistfully of the old days, when ‘free-range’ kids could gain hero status by breaking an arm on a slide, or learn from a healthy dose of risky activity. Neighbourhood kids kept each other safe, and most played without much adult supervision. A few however, said they were glad playgrounds today are safer than in the past. (One playground spill lead to lifelong health issues for one respondent.)

Despite the dangerous side to the Fraser Valley’s old playgrounds, most respondents said they avoided major catastrophe. Around 53% of people said they had never been hurt on a playground or park, although the remainder had experienced some sort of injury.

We asked readers about their memories about the parks, playgrounds, and other attractions from their childhood, and how those compare to today's play places. Here is what they had to say.

(Several submissions were sent in with no names attached. As always, we prioritize submissions that have full names.)

Linda Berti: “I broke my nose on a playground when I was about 8 years old. It was on the round spinning thing that we stood on and held onto for dear life, laughing until our lungs ached, taking turns spinning it to see who could get it going the fastest, and who could stay on the longest without letting the dizziness cause us to fall off. Well I fell the wrong way and one of the metal bars hit me in the face. How embarrassing! My parents never allowed any of us on that thing again! Although we did sneak onto it a time or two ... I love that playgrounds are so much safer and brighter now!”

Margaret Lucas: “As you mentioned, some slides as high! When I was six, my parents left me with my oldest sister and her husband and children. I was an afterthought. My nephew was only four years younger. My brother-in-law took us to the local play ground. There was a wonderful high slide, higher then I had seen before. I ran to it and climbed up. My brother-in-law yelled at me, so at the top, I turned to yell back. The shock of how high up I was made me dizzy. Next thing I knew was waking up in an ER. I had tumbled off. Thankfully no long term damage. Just a lifetime of fear of heights.”

Shawna Kollmyer: “My daughter, who is now 29, was injured at her elementary school playground. She chose to slide down one of the many wooden pillars as she and friends pretended they were firefighters. The rough wood gave her huge splinters in her thigh which required a few repeat visits to her doctor for professional removal. She still has the scars to prove it!”

Tia McCullough: “I grew up in Kitimat in the ’80s.

“There was a seedy playground at the entrance of town that was called 'Rocket Ship Park' by the locals. The pièce de résistance was a 14 foot high metal climbing structure shaped like, wait for it...a rocket ship! You would precariously haul yourself up the steep metal ladder to the top of the equipment, climb inside the body of the rocket ship, and slide down the rocket ship tube (that was close to a 90 degree angle from the gravel below.) By the time my peers and I were old enough to go to this park unattended, it was entirely rusted out in the inside—and was frequently used as a urinal/rainy day ganja smoking hut by local teenagers—lending a certain tangy je ne sais quoi to the experience. Did that stop us? No. Multiple generations of Kitimat children experienced the full glory of the rusty pee-pee slide, and it was a veritable right of passage until it was unceremoniously removed around Y2K.

“So, there I was. 7 years old.

“On this auspicious late-fall day, my entire 30-child class took a walk to Rocket Ship Park for PE class. We all made a bee-line for the rocket ship, which was slick with frosty urine trails tinged with amber rust. I had got to the top of the ladder, and entered the smelly inner sanctum. As I was standing to position myself for a turn down the danger chute, the herd shifted, and I got pushed backwards. I fell backwards, smashed my head on the slide, and then rapidly tumbled like a child-sized pair of dice. Down, down, down I flipped until I landed on my head at the bottom of the slide. Did that stop the person behind me from immediately following me down the slide? It did not. One after another, my classmates went shooting for the bottom, landing on me and each other, in a giant navy-blue and white heap of little kids in Catholic school uniforms, reeking of wee and streaked with orange rust.

“When COVID-19 became a thing in 2020, Kitimat-grown people circulated a meme that had a picture of the notorious rocket ship, with the caption ‘If you survived this, you are now immune to COVID.’ While the slide is no more, the legend and lore lives on in our hearts, minds and nostrils.”

Konrad von Hardenberg: “In the early ’70s, at an elementary school in Pitt Meadows, long before lunch hour supervisors, when kids were still raised ‘free range,’ a group of parents got together and built us kids an ‘Adventure Playground.’ It was awesome! Mostly built out of logs and heavy timbers, it included a 50 foot long zip line, from which we would just hang, harness free, 8-12 feet above the ground. Also, there were climbing nets, monkey bars etc. The teeter totters were 18’ long 3x10 beams pivoting on a crudely built frame of metal pipe.

“The kids developed a game where one would volunteer to sit on one end, while several others would push down as hard as they could on the other end to try and throw the other one off. Think predecessor to the mechanical bull. There were no handles to hang on to, you just had to grip the 3x10 (with a 8-12 year olds hands) as hard as you could, crossing your legs underneath, hanging on for dear life, hoping not to get thrown off on to the hog fuel padding below. On multiple occasions, kids were launched straight up into the air, including my younger 9-year-old brother who promptly broke his arm. While painful, he gained almost hero status and likely the whole school signed his cast. Nobody seemed to bat an eye, including my parents. This was just kids being kids.

“The playground remained as is for several years in spite of its obvious dangers. In today’s bubble wrap world, that playground wouldn’t have lasted a week, without protest and lawsuits. Yet, we survived. Bring back the ‘free range’ I say. It’s a great way to grow up.”

Karen Sinclair: “Merry go round (metal) where bigger kids would make it go so fast it would launch younger kids off onto the ground.”

Julie Bowman: “Great idea revisiting old playground equipment which I remember from my youth in the 1950’s. In spite of the bumps, bruises, scrapes and occasional broken bones that we all experienced on these playground devices, I believe it taught us a lot about survival, how to look after ourselves and increased our strength, coordination and judgement skills. I think that playgrounds are a little too safe now, preventing kids from some risk taking which is a learning experience in life. Thanks for doing this story!

“The Giant Stride. As some kids lost their grip and fell off, the loose swinging metal chains/handles would fly around hitting other kids still clinging on. There was one at my elementary school in West Vancouver. I think it was even taller than this one!

“The Iron Horse. Heavy iron ride on horse and as kids pumped it would go back and forth, faster and faster with inevitably someone flying off or the front person bumping themselves on the handle. With more and bigger the riders, the faster it went. There was one at Departure Bay in Nanaimo.

“Merry Go Round. Pushed by other kids or parents, it flew around faster and faster. If you did manage to stay on, when you got off you staggered around in a dizzy state. These were everywhere!”

Sally Coulter: “I’m sharing this story on behalf of my younger brother. The park in question is in Ladner, late ‘60s. The questionable piece of equipment was an 8’ long, steel rocking contraption meant to have you imagining you were riding a trusty steed (along with several friends). Each seat was divided by a steel handle/grip to hold onto when you really got rocking! Unfortunately for him the bigger kids (me included) got the ‘Horse’ rocking and he pitched forward and knocked his teeth out on the steel handles.”

Vivian Harder: “I loved the playground spinner. The one that could spin so fast that kids would get dizzy and be flung far and wide. Especially if bigger kids got it going at warp speed. It was also possible to fall under this thing.

“My sister got her leg broken on the two-seated slider. She hoped off, her friend did not. So when the ride slide back, the weight of the other rider had enough force to break a leg.

“The teeter totter was also dangerous if one rider got off suddenly."

Rev. Lea Walters: “In my youth, we had the local elementary school playground only. Swings, monkey bars, dome-like monkey bars, an old wooden boat and large tires. Then we had fields for all kinds of activities. The playground at school was only used during school hours. Of those seven years, only one child was hurt on the play equipment—the monkey bars and a broken arm. The disaster of my youth at Glenwood Elementary happened in the parking lot. Two children were hit by a car, which suffered from a factory defect. It surged forward and ran into the side of the school. Horrific and unforgettable. Our neighborhood played together in backyards, forested areas, gravel pits, creeks, mostly unsupervised with a 'be home for dinner, or before dark' rule. We kept each other safe for the most part out of fear—if someone got hurt we would all be in trouble.”

Grace Friesen: “We also had the long metal slide—we'd grease it with the inside of a potato chip bag so we could go faster. We also had a merry-go-round that we would push as fast as we could. We had a paddling pool with no supervision. As far as I know, nobody ever got injured but at that age, you wouldn't have noticed anyway. My sisters and I would spend all day at the playground along with our friends, again, with no supervision. It was great!”

David Nielsen: “In the 1950s Rosedale Elementary had an outside wooden stair fire escape on the old building. On the first landing of the stairs was a cabinet that was used to keep the sports equipment. The cabinet was kept locked with a padlock. In the summer the sports equipment was stored elsewhere and the padlock was removed. One day in the summer my friends and I were playing hid and seek in the school yard. A friend and I both decided to hide in the sports gear cabinet. I crawled onto the bottom shelf and he crawled onto the top shelf and we pulled the door shut behind us. The other kids could not find us and eventually they gave up and went home. That was when we discovered that the door could not be opened from the inside. At first it was funny but panic and much yelling soon developed. No-one came to our rescue. After what seemed like forever we decided we would have to break out. With much coordinated kicking we eventually knocked the end off the cabinet and escaped. We tried to repair the cabinet and managed to make it almost look right. We told no one and I don't know what happened that September when the teachers opened it to put in the soccer balls. I never again crawled into a cabinet of any sort.”

Sandi Sovio: “Near misses included riding the spinning round platform with the rails (can’t remember its name?). I’m (age 7?) pushing it hanging onto a rail and I can’t keep up. I let go and the next rail hits me and knocks me to the ground.”

Bev Olfert: “As a kid, I loved playgrounds—and the wilder, the better. One of my favorite memories comes from my elementary school days in Abbotsford. (I’ll spare them the full spotlight, just in case!) On the playground there was a huge structure made from old telephone poles, with tire swings dangling from metal chains. We had a system: one of us would climb into a tire swing while a friend held it steady. Then, another friend would launch a second tire—pushing it into a wide, perfect circle. When the spinning had reached peak speed—bam!—they’d send us colliding into each other, the tires spinning together before spinning out in opposite directions. Looking back, I have no idea how they let us do that every single day. But I’m so glad they did.

“I also really loved the maypoles, I think they were called, where we all grabbed a handle on the end of chain, ran as fast as we could in a circle and then launched ourselves and swung around and around until . . . .we all fell off ;)

“Even as adults—well, kind of adults—we couldn’t resist a good swing set. There was this one park (not in Abbotsford, for the record) with RIDICUOUSLY tall/ high swings. It took everything we had, full strength and determination, to get them to the place where the chains goes loose for just a second at the very top of your swing. When you got to a full swing - you were (I want to say literally ;)) flying! It was great fun.”

Lionel Chambers: “My castle-like elementary school had a 'boys' and a 'girls' play area in the basement for rainy days. It rained a lot so we spent much time at recess and lunch playing there. It was totally constructed of cement with several pillars near the middle. We collided with them often while running and the solid floor was also impacted.
We played ‘squish’ where we would line up against a pillar and all try to squish the person against the column until he couldn't stand the pressure and had to let some other victim take his place. I received a few bumps to the head during our time in the basement but have no recollection of anyone getting majorly hurt. If you got bumped, you were 'stupid' to have done so and the onus was on you to 'smarten up' We grew up tougher in those days! Today's youth grow up relying on others to look after them in so many ways.”

Susan Walsh: “I grew up in Burnaby. It had a park supervisor program every summer. University recreation students were hired for each park. Every year a shed full of craft and safety supplies would be dropped off and shortly the staff would arrive. This was a municipality funded program completely free to the families who benefited from it. Obviously, crafts were part of the job but it was so much more. They organized sports teams and we’d compete against the other parks. Our families were mostly poor so this was the only ‘organized’ sport available to us. Every kid I knew was a part of it.

“One day my brother was playing in the park bush. He disturbed a hornet’s nest and was stung over 40 times, mostly on his head. It was the quick response of the supervisor that saved his life. He was driven home by the supervisor and immediately taken to hospital.”

Carla S: “The gigantic mound/pile of ancient enormous tractor tires at Cheam elementary in the 1990s. We hid and played and it was hilarious and probably very dangerous.”

C. Bishop: “In the ’60s it was popular to put large metal monkey bars in playgrounds and this one was snapped like a rocket I guess with space flight all the rage. I was 8 years old and hung upside down on the bars, fell straight down and hit my head on the paved playground…lead to bad headaches and eventually scoliosis that has plagued me the rest of my life. So when I see all the new style cushier playground tops I say good for the awakening around that safety issue.”

Mare A: “We often lived in cheaper housing near industrial areas in southern Ontario. No real playgrounds in those days except on school grounds. One memorable place we played was in a railway yard abutting Beaty washing machine factory before it was shut down kitty corner to our house. There were open topped cars of Christmas tree ornament glass that was fascinating! I lost part of a finger exploring an unshelled water pump playing in the barn where my father slipped hogs, crimping the hose to stop the um [sic] as he went from stall to stall. When the motor stopped I stuck my finger in. The final e.g. is when we lived on the bush side of the Island highway and spent the days on the beach on the other side. We lost a puppy who was hit by a car but none of us kids got hit.”