We lived in southern California. It was in the late 1960s, possibly early 1970s.
Gray Y was a youth club, part of the YMCA, hence the “Y” part of the name. Kind of like the Indian Guides, which we also belonged to, or the Cub Scouts, which we also did. We did stuff, like held pinewood derbies (those little wooden cars you carve yourself and race down a track), we went to the mountains once a year to play in the snow, we sold stuff at fund raisers (I always hated doing fund raisers, and I think this was where I exited, stage left). We had t-shirts. We had a football team, and I think a basketball team.
LOL! You got the first part right. The second part, no. The guy who said it had to do with meeting on Saturdays and doing athletics was more right than anybody else. Since me and my brothers were part of it when we lived in California, Los Angeles County, it certainly had nothing to do with “Genesee, NY”. But we did other things besides sports. It was a general plan something to do next week, let’s do it. Even though we met at the group leader’s home, usually, when we did do sports like football and basketball, we used YMCA facilities.
Guess that’s one I haven’t heard of. I must have lived on the wrong side of the tracks
I remember one incident, and I honestly don’t remember if it was in Gray Y, cub scouts, or Indian Guides, but the group purchased many bundles of deer hides, and we had them tanned, and then we bought quite a lot of finished leather for use in projects. But it was at night, and there were these bundles of deer hides, complete with hair, oozing fat, and blood. This one kid was very upset when he learned he was looking at dead deer, and he was crying. I’m not mocking him at all, just one of those anecdotes from life, observing the differences in people and all. I suppose he would have done well in Hi-Y.
I notice that my post from several years ago didn’t make this clear, but the Gray-Y (or Gra-Y) program was part of the local YMCA, and was held in the YMCA building.
I kinda miss it. I got to swim, work out, make craft projects, and see a movie. The film quality ranged from abysmally bad (like Giant from the UnknownGiant from the Unknown - Wikipedia ) to pretty decent (Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, which wasn’t all that old a film at the time)
Yes, well because I was searching for Gray-Y, because it was such an obscure piece of ephemera of my past, and I found this thread, I knew it was a program under the auspices of the YMCA, and our events were generally held at our local YMCA. The basketball games, the football games, and the pinewood derbies were all held at the local Y. I think we had green t-shirts. I don’t remember what was written on them. Anybody who was a member of the Gray-Y would already have known it was something the YMCA did, so they might not even mention it because if you were in it, you already knew it was YMCA, and it might not occur to you to have to spell it out. Thanks for the thread, I can’t believe I got up at 3 in the morning to search for this long lost memory. We lived in Artesia, California, and our club leader lived in Norwalk, California, and our YMCA was in Bellflower, California. All cities close by each other.
B.T.W., Seventh Voyage of Sinbad was one of my favorites as a kid. I remember Dad and Mom taking us to see it, possibly my earliest ever outdoor drive in movie memory. I wouldn’t remember more than about two scenes from that movie if it hadn’t been for me buying the complete Ray Harryhausen collection as an adult.
I was a member of the Gra-Y in Atlanta,Ga in the 60’s. It was somewhat of a subsidiary of the YMCA. Our elementary school Oak Grove was affiliated as such with the YMCA in that we had a sports team for grades 4 & 5 (if I remember correctly) and 6 & 7. There was no “middle school” in Atlanta during those WONDERFUL TIMES YYYEAH BUDDY!!! We played football, basketball and soccer. No cleats during football…just tennis shoes (what all “sneakers” were called back then). Pop Warner football wore cleats…not the Gra-Y. As an extra added attraction when we were in the 7th grade (1967) our coach H. Broughton made arrangements for us to play in Savannah, Ga. against the local teams down there. We rode the train Nancy Hanks. This was an event to behold above most others. Too bad it has been lost to history. Unbelievably so I have no photos of any of the trip. Our team won our game(s)? but it was the trip itself I recall more than the game. Please excuse any and all grammatical errors.
