Cleveland Heights High School. I have no idea how this was enforced across the street.
Same. In New York City. Certainly by the time I was ten or eleven, at the oldest. Maybe earlier.
I grew up in a medium city. Once we hit the age of 7 or 8, we would have thought nothing of biking across the city, taking a bus downtown, shooting squirt guns in the woods a few streets or a couple neighbourhoods over, or walking or biking to the general (“variety”) store a mile away… My friends parents were the same way. They knew nothing much was likely to happen. Maybe some parents still feel the same way?
I wasn’t alive in 1963, but my father was, and smoking was likewise prohibited then at school. It was more of a discipline thing than an anti-smoking this as in “You kids should wait until you are older before you smoke.” Then in the 70s and 80s things were more hands off, then the anti-smoking wave came and banned it for kids and adults.
I was in the midst of that change. My high school was grades 7-12. In 7th and 8th grade, they had the smoking area. That was banned by my 9th grade year and in my senior year, the legislature passed a law banning the possession of tobacco by those under 18 (it had previously been against the law to sell tobacco to those underage, but if you acquired it by some other means, then there was no law against possession or use) and the school made it clear that if they found you in possession of tobacco, they would file a complaint with the local juvenile courts. So, in 5 short years I witnessed such a drastic change.
This sounds so unbelievable to me that I am cringing as I am typing. In early to mid '50s Brooklyn I had very much the same experience as others stated (out the door, have fun, come back for dinner)
I was either 11 or 12 and wanted to go to Coney Island, for the beach, not the rides. Mom said I should take my sister who was 3.5 years younger. And, if I cleaned the house today, she would give me $2 to spend. The morning of the beach trip she suggested that I take along her friend’s 6 or 7 year old profoundly developmentally disabled son, so she and her friend could spend the day alone. We took the F train to Stillwell Avenue, and went to the beach. Little Bobby was non-verbal, but did walk. With a blink of my eye he was gone. The beach was crowded…I was frantic. Someone pointed me to the “Lost & Found” under the boardwalk. I left my sister with a stern warning to not get off the blanket. Bobby was in the “Lost & Found” with some policemen.
Sorry…I hit enter by accident. They turned Bobby over to me with very little questions. I doubt that would happen today.
Yeah. I wandered the streets in Manhattan-- not downtown, mind you-- our neighborhood, but that was Morningside Heights. I went outside on my own from about the age of three, with a dime to make a phone call, and a bus token.
I was old enough to know which bus stopped closest to our apartment, and recite our address and phone number, and my first and last name, and my parents’ names.
I walked to and from preschool but I just walked a block or so alone before I met up with other kids going to the same school, many of whom were older, and some of whom were my cousins.
When I was out playing, it was with older kids who lived nearby, whom my mother knew, and again, some of whom were my cousins. I could not operate our elevator by myself, so I had to wait in the morning on the weekends until some kids stopped by, and my mother let me go with them, so she had an idea of whom I was with. Year by year, I became one of the older kids.
The kids I played with were as old as 10-- the oldest elementary school kids. Junior high and high school kids didn’t have time for us, and didn’t play kick the can, stoop ball, hide and seek, or red rover.
We played in the street, or empty lots, but cars were cautious where we played. It was nearly always local traffic that expected to see kids playing.
After we moved, when I was 8, the dynamics were similar-- kids from about 3-10 played together in the neighborhood, and the older kids looked out for the younger ones. You’d been a younger one once, and you had looked up to the big kids. It was fun being a big kid, and having the littler ones looking up to you, so you didn’t mind at all being responsible for them.
I think the chain was broken when parents started signing their kids up for all sorts of afterschool and weekend lessons and structured activities. There were no older kids, so the little ones weren’t safe out playing anymore, and no one was teaching them “kid culture” anymore, anyway.
Kind of sad.
We had those at my Catholic elementary school in Culver City in the 60s. There was the big merry-go-round and the little merry-go-round. The small one was older, the rivets on the metal plates were loose so you had to watch out for pinched skin on you thighs if you were a girl (as I was), and it was slightly tilted. I don’t know if it was due to that last feature, but you could get it spinning a lot faster than the big one. So, of course, the small one was most popular. The favorite game was to get it spinning as fast as you can. Then you jumped off. Onto an asphalt playground…that was so old it was more like gravel than a smooth surface. I don’t think I had many days as a child without scabby knees.
Scabby knees were pretty normal. I can’t think when the last time was that I saw a kid with scabby knees. I suppose it must still happen sometimes; but mostly now kids doing the sorts of things that would have given us scabby knees seem to be wearing knee (and elbow) protectors.
Sunburns were normal, too. First hot days of the summer pretty near everybody – including some of the grownups – got sunburnt. Eventually you’d tan, and be all right for the rest of the summer.
Not me. I gave up trying to tan. Glad I did because I look a lot younger than most women my age.
True. Some people can’t. I don’t remember how they managed – the kids, that is. The grownups would have just covered up, grownups often wore hats anyway.
Oh yeah. And the remedy was soothing, cooling Noxema with the very distinctive menthol smell. I bought a jar of Noxema a few years ago just so I could smell it-- yup, hasn’t changed a bit. One whiff and I was propelled back to the sofa in our living room, smearing the stuff all over my arms and shoulders, trying to make the pain go away… 
Ah, yes the merry-go-round. My elementary school had one of those on the playground, but of course kids did what kids do and someone always got sick on it every day. So they took it out and replaced it with… no joke, a three chain tire swing, which motivated and bored kids could easily get spinning even faster than the merry-go-round. That got taken out after only a couple of days. 
That’s funny. Looking back to my childhood in the sixties, kids always had scabby knees. All kids. As thorny_locust said, it was just normal.
And you really don’t see that much anymore.
Yes. I remember peeling the burnt skin off.
Of course, we know a lot more about the effects of sunlight now, and it isn’t going to ruin a kid’s summer if you make them put on some sunscreen.
I’m pretty careful with my own blonde, fair-skinned kids. It’s not helicopter parenting. No big deal.
Also true.
I don’t think anybody in the 50’s knew that long-term damage could be occuring. We did understand that severe enough sunburn could make you sick in the short term, but the ordinary level of red, ouch, then peeling wasn’t known to be dangerous – not too surprising that it took a long time to figure out when the danger usually didn’t show up until decades later.
I do think there was expected to be a lot more tolerance for moderate levels of ouch; which now seems to be considered OK only in the context of sports or exercise.
Our neighborhood playground has a three chain tire swing, and has since our kids were little. They loved it, and loved the spinning.
OTOH, with typical American “if one is enough ten is always better” thinking, we use so much sunscreen that Vit D deficiencies are common.
Yup.
Intelligent design, hell. You don’t get sun, you get vitamin D deficiency. (And, possibly, depression.) You do get sun, you get skin cancer. (And/or, possibly, eye problems.)
Our schools are not permitted to have “dynamic” playground equipment at all. That is, nothing that moves.
So no swings or or merry-go-rounds or teeter-totters.
Our public playground equipment has to meet a published national standard for “safety” (old-style merry-go-rounds don’t qualify), but that doesn’t preclude moving equipment . The restriction for schools is about supervision and legal (financial) responsibility. Public playgrounds aren’t more safe, but they’re somebody else’s problem.