of " Got 'em, Got 'em, Got 'em, Need 'em, Got 'em, Need 'em". But for me, that was in the 50s.

How nice it is to now continue amassing those sets, started back then, and worrying as little about condition as I did then. You see? a "Need 'em" is a "Need 'em"! It transcends condition.

Thank you, Mom - you loved ol' pack rat!

In those days (the early 1950's), flipping was a skill sport, and it seems to be a lost art. I grew up in Levittown, Long Island, New York, and here is what we meant by "flipping": We would hold the card in one hand, gripping the card with the thumb on one edge and the fingers on the other edge. Then we would use a "flipping" motion, swinging the arm from back to front, something like an underhand softball pitch. We would release the card when the hand was even with the hip. The card would go straight down, rotating several times. The idea was to predictably make the card land face-up (or face-down), every time. To play the game, the first person would flip a card. This was the marker, and every other player tried to match it, going in sequence. If you matched, you stayed in the game, and the pile accumulated. If you did not match, you were out, but your cards stayed in the pile. One by one, players would miss, and be out. The last player (who did not miss) would then win all the cards in the pile. The best players seemed like they could match indefinitely, but I think that realistically, 50-75 in a row would be exceptionally good.

To the best of my knowledge, this sport, like dodgeball, has vanished from the scene. More's the pity.

for my little league team. After the game we give each kid last years set of baseball cards. At practice next week, they have to bring 50 cards they are willing to lose in a game of chance. We teach them odds and evens, topper and how to throw for distance. It is quite amusing and we are doing our best to keep the fun aspect of card collecting alive.

Stories of card-flipping are often recounted as if it were a universal pastime.  But I wonder?  Back in my hometown -- Chicago area --  we never saw anybody flip cards. (We DID pitch pennies, tho, in a related activity, no doubt.) 

We traded doubles or put unwanted cards into the spokes of our bicycles with clothepins to hold em, to make that motorcycle sound.

So, posing this question to the others:     flip or no flip?  (and state location of childhood!)

We ABSOLUTELY flipped..The minor league of flippers (me included) flipped indoors..while the Major League flippers preferred outdoors as the wind (somehow) did not affect them..
The way we played was flipping a certain amount of cards, let say 5 at a time, and the challenger had to flip the exact number of heads or tails in the EXACT order.
A smaller amount of classmates would SCALE cards...with the winner being the closest to the wall.

Marty

Marty, where did you grow up,  East Coast somewhere?  Betcha quite universal in that region.  Others, I don't know.

I'm a little younger than you flippers, I think (I'm 48), but I do clearly recall a similar game in 1968 and 1969. Each kid would get his stack ready and then add cards from the top of his stack face up to the pile. If your card matched the color of the colored circle (that enclosed the team name)on the card just below it you got the whole stack. Kids from that era probably still remember the colors associated with the various teams: Tigers and Cardinals yellow, Cubs and White Sox brown, Yankees and Dodgers red, etc. Wonder how many thousands of dollars in PSA 8 Topps cards I lost in that game?

Those colored circles were 1968 and 1969 Topps, prime time for me too. We played a game called Topper where we took turns throwing cards down a long hallway. If I threw a card that landed on top of another card (hence the name, "topper"), I win all the cards thrown. I gre up in a suburb of Los Angeles.

My buddy of the same age grew up on Long Island. They played odds and evens. Two players drop cards that turn on their way down, like flipping a coin. Both face up or face down, player A wins ("evens"), one card up the other down, player B wins ("odds).

You are exactly correct Ralph...I did grow up on the East Coast (NYC) where flipping and scaling were the rage..

But as much time as we spent on flipping didn't compare to our all time favorite game - STOOP BALL !!!

Marty

grew up in chicago 1950's/60's never flipped cards.maybe an east coast thing?

Well your points are well taken. I guess that "flipping" was not a universal pasttime; and that the methods and rules differed.

In the 50s in my neighborhood of Queens NY (and everywhere else I knew - which extended for many blocks in all directions) flipping was typically conducted using a method similar to that described by George A., but with a different objective.

The objective was to flip the card towards a "wall" which most often was actually a stoop ie. the base of a set of stairs often made of brick, which led to the front door of a row house.

The flipper who achieved the card closest to this wall won all the cards flipped. Except for the following:
- If your card wound up on top of the closest card, you won them all
- If your card wound up leaning against the stoop you won them all, unless your "leaner" was knocked down which then disqualified it ... unless when knocked down, it wound up on top of the card which knocked it down

I could go on, I suppose, but why? It was silly, but good.

We also played the game that Gil described, but we called it "scaling." In scaling, we drew a line on the ground about 10 feet from a wall. We stood behind the line and "scaled" the cards in the direction of the wall, with the object of having the card come to rest as close as possible to the wall. In scaling, the card was held betweem the first and second fingers, and was scaled with a backhand motion, similar to hitting a soft backhand in tennis. As I recall, the best technique was to release the card very close to the ground (6 to 12 inches above the ground), so that it almost skimmed the ground, and came to rest just as it reached the wall. If you were lucky (or very good), the card would have just enough velocity to reach the wall and become a leaner. As Gil said, a leaner was an automatic winner, unless it was trumped (not a term we used at that time) by a leaner on the leaner!

I would like to politely disagree with Gil on one point......I do not think these games were "silly." We were 9 or 10 years old at the time, and these games were compatible with our skill levels. But they did require skill, and they were competitive. I think this type of activity is good for young whippersnappers. It teaches them that, if you practice and hone your skills, your accomplishments are likely to be rewarded. It also teaches that, no matter how skillful you may become, luck still plays a part. And it also teaches you that there is always someone who is better.

I am disappointed with the games that somehow succeeeded flipping and scaling, which are based solely on luck, with absolutely no element of skill required. What does this teach you? How to play a slot machine, or buy a lottery ticket?

Grew up in San Francisco in the 1950's and here is what we played.
Flipping - simple matching of 'heads' or 'tails' wins you the card(s) or the pot.
Kissies - aka Toppers, stand behind a line toss a card into a designated area 15-20 feet away and if your card lands on another you win the pot.
Non Kissies - similar to above but if your card lands on another you lose or are out, last person left wins all!
Leaners/Knockdowns - Place a couple of cards up against a wall and taking turns, whomever knocks down the last card wins the pot.

What we done in good old Blighty was we would lean 1 card each against a wall and "flick" your card at it,if you knocked the card down you won the card,AND all the cards that missed,it is no surprise that all my 60's cards have soft corners after aiming at a brick wall for hours at a time. The othe rule in the schoolyard was if some one dropped the stack of cards you would hear "SCRAMBLE" being screamed and then it became a free for all.

for us in Bronx & Queens NYC it was flipping and scaling, both indoors & out---if you lost all your cards, you might earn a few back by taking some knuckles---that's when the other guy put 30 or so cards in his fist on edge & hit the top of your knuckles really hard---o/w you needed 5 cents & a new pack of cards to get back in the game.
Marty---stoop ball was cool all right, but how many sewers could you hit the ball (the Spaulding, or as we said it "spawldeen") in stickball? (This would be the "long" version of stickball, played down the middle of the street, as opposed to "against the wall" in the school yard)

Hello Don:

Yes, Stoopball was great.

But Stickball was better..Our Queens neighborhood was NOT a sewer type game..We were the schoolyard version and we kept records in what we liked to call the SQSL (South Queens Stickball League).

We played with the 'Spawldeen' BUT our ball of choice was the PENSY PINKY - that ball would fly !!..When the pop ups were hit - we called them Egg Balls since the ball morphed into an Egg shape. No one was allowed to use a Glove because that was a sissy move. You had to try and grap it no matter how difficult the spin was.

We drew a square on the wall behind the batter with pastel chalk, as the strike zone and made sure that the pitcher wiped off the chalk before his threw another pitch because a few crafty southpaws would PRETEND to wipe off the chalk..those devils !!

I was raised in Canada and we flipped and traded everything from hockey to the Beatles and Batman. I remember I would only flip doubles and triples and would not trade for a card that had been flipped or damaged unless I was desperate for the card to complete a set. Anyone who tried to flip a checklist was treated as if they couldn't be trusted in a fair trade. I can remember in early grade school, taking a huge stack of Batman and Monkees duplicates to school to trade. I kept my first set of each type of card set as nice as possible; thankfully I still have many of those cards and probably will never part with them.

Best
Gary

Gary, I had forgotten how much we all hated checklists and that they were the first card thrown or flipped. Every once in a while, the checklist looked almost the same on the front and the back so when we flipped cards you had to make sure a 'heads' was a 'heads' and a 'tails' was a 'tails'. Such fun from a long time ago.

It appears that the guys in my neighborhood were not sufficiently sophisticated to differentiate among the flipping, pitching and scaling nomenclature which is appropriate; but we all sure knew that something magical happens to a Spawldeen when it impacts the point of a stoop.

Regarding stickball: in my neighborhood the local custom was to identify the barrel of the bat as the sawed off end. How about your area?

I'm with Ralph...no flipping in my neighborhood(Villa Park, IL just miles from Chicago). The worst I did to my baseball and non-sport cards(Look N See) was put them in rubberbands in my cigarbox. No way would I ever toss them against a wall!

Les and Ralph, If you didn't flip, play knockdowns or other games, how did you increase your card piles? Unless you were rich and able to afford buying pack after pack you had to do some sort of playing to get those cards that your buddy or neighbor kid had. Trading was only done as a last resort because it didn't help you get lots of cards in a hurry whereas winning card games would increase your stack.

Bill, you had to rummage through the vacant lot next door to the variety store, for empty bottles to return for the deposit.  That was always good for a quick pack or two . . .

You could hardly walk, with one bottle shoved down the left side of your dungarees, and another down the right; carrying two in one arm and the last in your free hand.
But that it what it took if you wanted two nickel packs .... unless you had gorilla arms.

How did you do it?

(No), don't tell me there was a simple way, that never occured to us!

the real prize were those giant 5 cent bottles----what a treasure! Most of the time it was cleaning up those smaller 2 cent bottles----we had to rotate where we cleaned them since the moms threw us out when they saw how filthy the bottles really were---"you don't know where those things have been!!!" (sure we did---we fished them out of the sewers)

The way I increased my card collection was to not play silly flipping games with them, and keep them in pristine condition, and trade dupes with others who also did not flip, and kept them pack-fresh.

Flipping must be a regional self-destructive thing.

You won't find a North Central boy doing that foolery.

I'm with Les.

wow keith did you miss out on lots of fun !!!-insert smiley, i never tried to add one. dont know how.

Instructions for adding smiley:

1 - type colon, like this -----------------------> :
2 - type close paranthesis, like this ----------> )

that is all. don't add spaces or unspecified steps.
When you are done, scroll down and press RESPOND.

gilbert, <-------good? thanks. ok,now how do i get him to wink?? just kidding, this is fine.

Tom---that little winky dink face is a riot!! Personally, I could find a lot of use for him if he stuck his tongue out---but that's just me--

:-p

Don, like this?

(Sorry, can't get an animated little yellow emoticon guy to stick his tongue out at you, so this manual version will have to do!)

Ralph---that's perfect---it goes on the end of all my work related emails starting today! (the phrase "raspberries" also brings on some flashbacks).
Now, if anyone ever gets the emoticon to work we can let the evil reprint/frauds know how we feel----wouldn't it be great to insert a big raspberry into the sellers listing?

You have to remember that at least in my neighborhood we collectors who weren't rich kids would wait for certain kids who flipped good condition cards of the better sports or non-sport sets. Then if you flipped your junk to a kid who just wanted a big stack of "stuff" you could catch some nice condition cards provided you could win them before they got beat up. We also knew who could flip and who couldn't and at least speaking for myself I would flip only dupes and if I liked a set I would sometimes try to build two clean sets.

My financing was dependant on my paper route and sometimes trading comics for cards. I can also recall trading marbles.

What memories, and oh the beautiful wrappers we threw away; they would overthrow the garbage cans on a Saturday outside the store by late in the day.

Best
Gary

The .02 small Coke or 7-up return deposit bottle, the .03 medium size (all flavors) or the .05 large was always an easy way to gain some quick cash. Usually found in empty lots, the bottles were worth the two block walk to the store. If we had less than .05 we would put the money into a gum machine and if we were lucky, we'd win a 'spotted or striped yellow gum ball' which entitled you to a .05 candy bar (also good for a pack of cards).
I didn't have a paper route but sold afternoon papers on a street corner in 1958 or 1959, a big day for me was earning .30 to .50 cents and not spending it before I went home.
As kids, a friend and I would go 'looking for money' in our neighborhood. We would look where the street meets the curb and on occasion we would find either pennies or nickels usually by the liquor store about four blocks away. One time we found a five dollar bill, I thought it was heaven.
Flipping did involve some skill, can you say ten heads in a row? Flippers will know what that means...and like Gary, we tried to win a new or unusual card, put it on the bottom of the pile and if we lost, we lost the doubles.