As we all are aware of in this day and age, kids get entertained very much by the electronics we now have at our reach. It is truly amazing what technology has created and it seems unlimited as to just what can be created. I know I will never be surprised, maybe befuddled. I have a two-year-old grandson who picks up a cell phone and immediately asks the owner, “What is your password?”

Rick Houser

Now of course this leads me into the days I was young and just how my brother, my friends and myself entertained ourselves. Since there hadn’t been all this inventing going on yet, we worked with what we had and/or what we made. I was very fortunate in having a brother like Ben in this area as he had the mind and ability to think and then create what most of our items were going to be. Just depending on our moods and the number of us involved determined what the event was to be.

Most often it was just only Ben and me and this made it even more special.  as hanging with a brother eight plus years older meant so much to me. The very first thing that came to mind was a sawed or square-shaped tobacco stick and the gravel in the driveway. We would pick out as good of a stick as we thought was good and then go to the back of our driveway which was by the corn crib and the barn yard gate. From the gate to the barn was 300 feet at least and the high side of the barn was over 40 feet in height. We then would sort through the gravel and pick out the best cylindrical in shape. Then grasping the tobacco stick with one hand and lofting the piece of gravel just as one would do a baseball, you quickly grasp the stick with the other hand and try to bat that rock as far as you could. Ben had a few years practice on me, but he would hit the rock 9 out of 10 times and many pieces of gravel would hit the barn and if all was perfect, one would clear the barn roof. I would connect more than 50 percent of the time and as I got older, I would get closer to the barn and finally I hit and cleared the barn also. Tons of the driveway went in the direction of the barn. I know one day dad had a couple truckloads of new gravel delivered and that evening he came down as we were batting some of the new gravel. He watched a few minutes and said you boys do know that I never have to put gravel in front of the barn because of you two? He was good a subtle hints.

Also on the corn crib was a basketball goal and we played a ton of the game horse and most of which I lost. A lot of evenings the Marshall boys would come over we would play horse or to 21. This was more when I had batted so much rock my hands had become sore. Tobacco sticks are anything but smooth. In early summer Ben and I would adjourn from the driveway to the side yard and next to an apple tree. This tree produced loads of apples but for some reason the tree never delivered an apple that my mom wanted to use. They were very bitter and never seemed to ripen completely. But if a fellow selected a limb maybe an inch in diameter and the length of a long baseball bat and then sharpen the smaller end to a point you had just made themselves an apple slinger. We would take the apples that now were the size of a walnut and stick them on the sharp end and take a batting stance. With a whip like motion and as much power as you had you would whip that apple in the direction of the barn. (About the same distance from the tree as from the gate.) This was a lot of fun and quite a challenge. We went to the tree most every evening or until we ran out of apples. The best side product from this was that the cattle in the barn yard reaped our deliveries.

If one can recall Dennis the Mennace always had a slingshot in his back pocket. Maybe that was where the idea came from or maybe not. I do know Ben nor I ever let a worn out inner tube get tossed away. After selecting a good forked branch that was strong enough to take the drawing back of a strong  piece of inner tube we built our own sling shots. The only rules were never to shoot at animals or humans or shoot it around the house or car. We never had to be told twice as a violation on this meant dad would have to punish us and there was never a suspended sentence.

We also build pop guns that kind of worked but not too well. If we thought of something we would find scrap wood and with a hammer, some nails and a draw knife we would build something or at least try.

Now if we were only resting or on a short break we have taken the long blades of grass (preferably Fescue) hold the blade flat and between both hands cupped and the grass blade held tight, we would blow hard and create a duck call. This wasn’t too easy but it was entertaining. We had farms that had good sized creeks beside where we were and we would gather up the roundest and flattest rocks we could and hooking one between the index finger and thumb and using a side armed delivery and releasing it low onto the water we would try to see how many times that rock would skip. If you got three skips you were doing ok but more was becoming an expert. My very best was seven and that was a long time ago.

Several of these entertainments I have taught my daughter and son and when I ask them the other day the both let me know they remembered and still probably could do them still and also they said they were better than me now. That last sentence kinda hurt but at the same time I was so very happy I taught them some of my home entertainment events that Ben and I found fun to do. Skipping rocks can go forever if you don’t run out of rocks.

Rick Houser grew up on a farm near Moscow in Clermont County and loves to share stories about his youth and other topics. He may be reached at houser734@yahoo.com.