Summary

Game names (and types): 'Tiggy', 'Bedlam' (chasing games), 'Practical Jokes' (language play), 'Old Grady' (elimination game)
Alternative type: running game

Handwritten descriptions of chasing games, practical jokes and an elimination game composed for Dr Dorothy Howard by E. A. Jackson, Jill Paterson and Patricia Anne Watson, students at Clayfield College, in October 1954. E.A. Jackson describes the chasing games 'Tiggy' and 'Bedlam', which both can involve any number of players. Jackson states that more than one player can be 'it' concurrently in 'Tiggy', whereas 'Bedlam' involves one team chasing an opposing team. In 'Bedlam' captured players are placed in a guarded ring known as a 'soup-pot' from which they can be freed by their fellow team members. Jill Paterson transcribes two practical jokes. Patricia Anne Watson describes the elimination game 'Old Grady', which involves a player directing other children to perform particular actions. Players who fail to correctly carry out 'Old Grady's' instructions are eliminated. Watson writes that she played 'Old Grady' with Sue, Pat, Robin, Barbara, Rosemary and Ray between 1953 and 1954.

One of a collection of letters describing a children's games written to children's Folklorist Dorothy Howard between 1954 and 1955. Dr Howard came to Australia in 1954-55 as an American Fulbright scholar to study Australian children's folklore. She travelled across Australia for 10 months collecting children's playground rhymes, games, play artefacts, etc. This letter, together with the other original fieldwork collected by Dr Howard during this period, is preserved in the Dorothy Howard Collection manuscript files, part of the Australian Children's Folklore Collection (ACFC), Archive Series 3. The ACFC is an extensive collection documenting children's folklore and related research.

Physical Description

Handwritten game descriptions in blue ink on lined paper. Features text by three different hands; text printed on both sides of page.

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