Pitching Cards in the Schoolyard - Dr. Ed Iannuccilli

Pitching Cards in the Schoolyard - Dr. Ed Iannuccilli

The Academy Avenue Elementary schoolyard was our favorite place for pitching cards. A high granite wall supporting the staircase just outside and below the principal’s office protected the game from the wind and her eagle eye.

We pitched baseball cards to win more cards to add to our stash. Collectors might vomit if they knew that we used potentially valuable treasures for a game that ruined them with scratches, bent corners, damage to faces on the front and loss of the stats on the back. If we had stored the cards away and looked at them fifty years later, we might be in for a big surprise. But who knew in 1952?

The rules were simple; step to an agreed-upon distance from the wall and pitch in turn to the wall. I squatted to pitch, err flip, holding the card between my thumb and two fingers. The winner had the card closest to the wall after the last pitch. Rules varied.

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We might throw up to three cards at a time, or alternate throwing one. A thrown card had to hit the wall. If the card hit the wall and topped another, that thrower retrieved both.

The first person to successfully have a card lean against the wall in any fashion won all the cards thrown . . . unless. If your stander was knocked down by one of the opponent's three throws, you lose all. If the thrower’s tune of, “I cleaned up!” was yours, then, well OK.

It was a quick, fun, simple, winner-take-all game. I experienced it all from an empty pocket to one bulging with my spoils. “ Oh my God, look what I got in this pile! Ted Williams!”

The game was important to us kids, not only because we experienced the joy of winning and the pain of losing, but also because we were participating, developing skills . . .pitching and peopling . . . and maybe building character along the way. I like to think we learned integrity and respect. We certainly learned the truth because the cards told it all.

Winning was important, but as soon as we walked away from that wall, that game, we gave it little thought. I like to think that at this early age, we were having fun, and that winning was not the most critical factor. Sure, winning added to the enjoyment, but it was the anticipation of playing, and the social activity that accompanied it, that was more important. I like to think it was our first excursion into balancing the ‘stuff’ of life.

I won a lot and thought I was good. But the day I lost my huge stash, I had a new best friend, humiliation. And pain. I loved my cards. Oh, and what about the kid returning to class, barely able to swing his leg up a step because the cards, one of them Ted, were padded in his Dungaree pocket and weighed him down?

I like to think he remained a friend.