Looks like the “call out” may have wusta roots! I grew up on the north side of Worcester (Indian Lake/Norton Co) and we would ride our bikes around and yell, uh, like a bird call i guess, and if our buddeies were out and about they would make themselves known with the same call. Sort of “WHUUU-UUUUP” sound IIRC
God no, my mother would have killed me if she heard that. You knocked on the door and asked their mom/dad if they could come out and play.
Before the age of 10 or so yes. All the time, and god was I annoying.
Juuuuullllliiiiieeee can you come out and PLAY?!?!?!?! Juuuullliiiieieeee!!
Parents hated it.
I was such a little brat, but it wasn’t just me, all the kids in the neighborhood did the same thing.
Growing up in Queens in the 1970s it was usually a knock-on-the-door, ask-for-friend-X routine. Even for the apartment-dwellers in our area (a few sprinkled amid the mostly single family semi-attached houses), we’d buzz their apartment. Yelling at a kid’s house was generally reserved for acts of hostility.
It’s true though, we rarely used the phone. Back in the days before call waiting (never mind cell phones), using the phone was a Big Deal since the line would now be busy for any other “important” caller, which a 10-year-old kid calling to find out if Billy could come out to play was not - just scoot over a corners on your bike and find out first hand.
ETA: The other kind of “call out” was from parents or impatient teenage sibling-shepherds summoning kids in at dusk for dinner, when they knew Kid X was somewhere in this street or alleyway full of kids and it was hard to pick people out and they were too high and mighty to go in and hunt around.
We didn’t do it, because SOMEone’s parent’s would kick our asses if we did. Likely our own as well as whoever’s house we were at. 
No, I never did that.
Growing up in the 1970s, in a lower middle-class urban neighborhood in Buffalo, the call-out was the norm.
OH [TWO SYLLABLE DIMINUTIVE NAME]!
There was also the long version.
OH [TWO SYLLABLE DIMINUTIVE NAME]!
CAN YOU PLAY?
COME OUT TODAY!
OR WE’LL GO AWAY!
In my neighborhood, front doors were used only for formal occasions; e.g. the Pope came to visit. The call was always made at the side door.
Also, for context: this was in northeast Buffalo (before it turned into a distressed neighborhood in the late 1980s/early 1990s), with mostly single-family houses on 35’ wide lots, and only narrow driveways separating the houses. Every house had a side door that opened onto the driveway. You always called from the side door, never the front. I can’t emphasize this enough; if you called from the front, your mom will be getting a phone call from the callee’s mom.
Here’s a typical street in the neighborhood, for some idea on the setting where this all happened. There were some two-flats in the neighborhood, but the uppers were usually in-law apartments or occupied by elderly renters. I never had to call up to a friend in an upper.
Yep, this is exactly what I’m talking about.
When and where did you grow up, Kinthalis?
mmm
Nope. We knocked on doors and asked if they could come out.
Yep, it was the norm in my neighborhood. This was in the late 60’s/ early 70’s in suburban Detroit. Always in that same sing songy voice. None of the parents seemed bothered by it. I think they would’ve been puzzled if we knocked or rung the doorbell. Only adults did that. Also, I agree with Elmwood. We never went to the front door which was the formal entrance. Casual neighbors and kids used the side door. There was one exception. At my friends Carrie and Nancy’s house, they had a wild scary dog that hung out on the back porch and no kid dared call from their back door.
Nope, no calling.
I hated going to my neighbor’s door, tho. The dad - while actually kind and gentle - thought it was funny to be all “angry giant” and say “WHO IS KNOCKING AT MY DOOR?” when I knocked. But I was, like, 5. So mostly I would wait for them to be outside.
The kids on the other side of the block, we just joined them when we saw them.
I do remember my mom would call us IN! For some reason there was never a “you have to be home by X” rule. We just listened for her to call.
My name is “Jess” and my brother’s childhood nickname was “Trips” so she would call one of our names and they would sound the same and we’d both come running.
Exactly, word-for-word, my experience.
Including the part about late 60s/early 70s suburban Detroit. 
mmm
No. We were taught that it was more polite to knock on the door and ask.
Used to ring doorbells of friends and ask them/their parents if they could come out and play; ‘calling out’ in large apartment complexes was discouraged.
I *had *no friends when I was a child.
But I have plenty now! I am going to Karen’s apartment house on Riverside Drive and yell up in the direction of the 14th floor: “KAAAARRREEENNN! Come out and play?”
This is what I was going to post. Northern California…if we’re keeping track.
We totally did that in my neighborhood, pretty much exactly as it is recalled here.
Grew up in the suburbs, in Hawaii, in the 70’s.
South St. Louis County in the 60’s was similar to your short version.
Ohhhhhhhh Jimmy would have been the call (at the back door, although some kids were front door calls due to gates, dogs etc)
The ohhhhhh was pretty long sometimes 2 or three seconds. And it was a singsong voice similar to the air-ball chant only with a repeating note for 2 or three syllable names.
We didn’t do the long version except sometimes the ohhhhh name was followed by a “Come out and play”
[quote=“Eve, post:38, topic:594258”]
I *had *no friends when I was a child.
This is almost my experience too. All my friends were my cousins and siblings and other such relatives. Growing up, we lived in the same house most of the time.
At one time, we lived with my dad for the summer. There were over thirty of us living in one large home. Fun in some ways, you could always find someone to do something with, but there was only one bathroom!