What was your favorite piece of playground equipment as a child?

[MercyA]

A friend recently asked me if I played at the local park as a child. I spent SO many happy hours there and was reminiscing about some of the equipment that has long been removed, including a merry-go-round and a dizzyingly high curly slide. Another favorite was a cement pipe that we could climb on and inside. 

One of my favorites was this thing, which I just learned was called a "giant stride." You were meant to hang on the handles and start running until your feet lifted off the ground. Daredevils that we were, we sometimes also sat on the handles (one leg through each) and had someone push us. 

What were some of your favorites?

Edited July 17, 2022 by MercyA

[Terabith]

1 minute ago, MercyA said:

A friend recently asked me if I played at the local park as a child. I spent SO many happy hours there and was reminiscing about some of the equipment that has long been removed, including a merry-go-round and a dizzyingly high curly slide. Another favorite was a cement pipe that we could climb on and inside. 

One of my favorites was this thing, which I just learned was called a "giant stride." You were meant to hang on the handles and start running until your feet lifted off the ground. Daredevils that we were, we sometimes also sat on on the handles (one leg through each) and had someone push us. 

What were some of your favorites?

Okay, that does look ridiculously fun.  I've been surprised that there are so few merry go rounds anymore.  

[wintermom]

That swing/spin equipment was really fun! It wasn't at my local park, but I did play on this in the town near our cottage. It was so much fun! Regular swings was my next favourite thing at the park. 

[lmrich]

I spent forever on the rings and trapeze bar in my backyard. 
And the monkey bars and the swings... my parents got their money's worth out of that playset. 

We had a dome climber - my dad would take it apart before the winter so it would not rust and then put it back together again every spring.

[Scarlett]

I came in to click swing but then I saw monkey bars and I was like oh wow, I can’t choose. 
I had so much fun on the monkey bars. I was skilled! 

[kbutton]

I voted that I can't decide, but there are two things that rise to the top:

• If my dad was pushing, a merry go round. He was "that" dad except that he really was safety-conscious. He made sure anyone who wasn't up to it knew what was coming and had a chance to get off. 
• I've never seen one before or since, but one park had a huge bench style merry-go-round that the passengers would pump with their hands and feet. That was so.much.fun. It would be my favorite except that I didn't know it existed when I was little.

 

[itsheresomewhere]

Either the swings or the balance beam.  I loved just walking that thing.  It was about 3 ft off the ground at my elementary school.  

[Indigo Blue]

Swings.

[Melissa Louise]

Definitely swings. Loved going up so high I nearly flipped.

I also had a set of rings and a bar as a kid, and spent a lot of time hanging upside down. 

[HomeAgain]

I was a very short child, so things like the rings and parallel bars were difficult.  But my favorites were the rolling log (stand on it and run holding onto a bar) and the adaptive swings, where you pulled handles to make them go.

[katilac]

34 minutes ago, Terabith said:

 I've been surprised that there are so few merry go rounds anymore.  

Probably because there was always that one uncle who would challenge the way-too-many kids on it to hold on with only one hand, while he pushed it as hard as possible. 

[HS Mom in NC]

It's tie for me: swings and shade trees.  I grew up in PHX, so I really appreciate shade trees on playgrounds.

[stephanier.1765]

Merry-go-round, for sure, but I was a champ at walking along the top of monkey bars. I'd go across it with no fear...I miss that me.

[MercyA]

28 minutes ago, HS Mom in NC said:

It's tie for me: swings and shade trees.  I grew up in PHX, so I really appreciate shade trees on playgrounds.

My friends and I played in the roots of big trees quite a lot. They made good pretend ovens, seats, etc. when playing house.

[AbcdeDooDah]

1 hour ago, Scarlett said:

I came in to click swing but then I saw monkey bars and I was like oh wow, I can’t choose. 
I had so much fun on the monkey bars. I was skilled! 

Same! 

[Indigo Blue]

1 hour ago, HomeAgain said:

adaptive swings, where you pulled handles to make them go.

You know, those things were a huge chunk of swinging, heavy metal! They all disappeared from parks gradually when I was growing up. I used to love those things! In fact, much of what we had then has been replaced with a whole different safer version. I haven’t seen a scorch your skin hot metal slide in ages! 😁

[Indigo Blue]

Well, there’s this little zip line thing at a park near us. I’ve been known to glide on it if the park is pretty vacant. 
 

My dog used to love to sit in my lap and swing at that same park. I’d hold him with one arm and hold the swing with the other. He loved it. This was only a few years back. 

[rebcoola]

All of it but one of our favorites was the little rubber suspension bridge between play structures we used to load it up with pea gravel and jump on it to pop popcorn.

[Farrar]

Spider climber pyramid. There were no playgrounds near me as a kid, just the school playground. The swings there were pretty good, but about a block away from my grandparents' house in New Orleans, there was a giant one of these. In my memory, it was truly grand. Like, epic. I remember getting to the top and how dizzying the height was. It was probably about the height of the newer one in this image I found. So tall, but not the mind-boggling height it was in my mind.

[Farrar]

When I was in middle school, there was a playground with a merry-go-round and we used to make each other sick on it. That thing was grand.

When I was in high school, we used to leave campus to eat lunch at a playground and we'd wax the slide and make it really wild. I remember having to tell some poor family to please be careful as we left. I can see now that we were really a terror. That kid flew off that slide like mad.

[Dmmetler]

My school had metal glider swings. As someone with motor skills delays, those things were awesome because I didn't have to keep both sides of my body moving in a coordinated fashion. 

 

Also, the local park with all the little league and softball fields had this https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/article/a-playground-sparks-a-love-of-flying/

….found a better photo of the plane. In retrospect, I can’t believe anyone ever thought it was a good idea. 

 

Edited July 18, 2022 by Dmmetler

[mom2scouts]

2 hours ago, kbutton said:

I voted that I can't decide, but there are two things that rise to the top:

• If my dad was pushing, a merry go round. He was "that" dad except that he really was safety-conscious. He made sure anyone who wasn't up to it knew what was coming and had a chance to get off. 
• I've never seen one before or since, but one park had a huge bench style merry-go-round that the passengers would pump with their hands and feet. That was so.much.fun. It would be my favorite except that I didn't know it existed when I was little.

 

My elementary school had one of those merry go rounds that had pumps on each side and bench seats around it! We would fill it and then the bravest kids would sit on a dome in the middle and try to hang on.

[MercyA]

Someone made a homemade "Giant Strider" with a telephone pole and a car tire. Ingenuity!

 

[SKL]

I voted that I can't choose just one.

I enjoyed swinging, to the point of cherry bumps, especially if I was standing, jumping off, twisting, etc.

I enjoyed climbing apparatus, especially walking on top and other show-offy things.

We didn't have a "merry-go-round" at our nearby parks, but I did enjoy these when I could visit parks that had them.

See-saws, for doing fun individual balancing things, not so much for having to trust another person not to jump off the other side ....

[Laura Corin]

None of them? I  only came to enjoying physical movement as an adult.

[Just Kate]

My local park had what we called the witches hat. It was awesome! Kind of like a merry go round, but you could also tilt it as it spun, based on where the kids would sit or stand. The most brave would walk around while the hat was spinning!! I spent so much time on that thing. 
 

[Indigo Blue]

8 minutes ago, Just Kate said:

My local park had what we called the witches hat. It was awesome! Kind of like a merry go round, but you could also tilt it as it spun, based on where the kids would sit or stand. The most brave would walk around while the hat was spinning!! I spent so much time on that thing. 
 

Gosh, some of these things in this thread I’ve never seen in my life!

[J-rap]

Aw... those childhood playgrounds!  Even my children played on those, but I wonder how popular they are now?  (Since the internet!)

My favorite was always the teeter-totter, but not the small, young-children ones.  I liked the wooden ones where you could really go fast and high and they were a little dangerous.  So dangerous, that most parks eventually removed them.  But if I ever found a park that had one, I'd always go straight to that!

[Dmmetler]

1 hour ago, J-rap said:

Aw... those childhood playgrounds!  Even my children played on those, but I wonder how popular they are now?  (Since the internet!)

My favorite was always the teeter-totter, but not the small, young-children ones.  I liked the wooden ones where you could really go fast and high and they were a little dangerous.  So dangerous, that most parks eventually removed them.  But if I ever found a park that had one, I'd always go straight to that!

We found one in Dunedin NZ :). Pretty sure the species has been extirpated from the USA.

[Elizabeth86]

16 hours ago, MercyA said:

My friends and I played in the roots of big trees quite a lot. They made good pretend ovens, seats, etc. when playing house.

I came to say the same. Our school playground had he best old tree. The roots made what seemed like stairs down behind it and I spent most of my time there doing make believe stuff. 

[Myra]

Loved them twirl-go-rounds where 4 people sit across from each other and pump it with hands and feet to go around

 

 https://twirlgoround.com/

[Jaybee]

19 hours ago, HS Mom in NC said:

It's tie for me: swings and shade trees.  I grew up in PHX, so I really appreciate shade trees on playgrounds.

We would also play under the trees. We could find roly-poly/s under there, and we played with them.

[Kalmia]

My favorite were the spring-horses but hanging from a swing set and swinging back and forth. Very heavy metal horses. These were fantastic fun! But they also also knocked down or knocked out any child that ran in front or behind them within range of their swing arc. My second favorite was an inchworm shaped climbing structure with a big bug head, we called it the "Wum" which I think is child for "Worm".

[kbutton]

2 hours ago, Myra said:

Loved them twirl-go-rounds where 4 people sit across from each other and pump it with hands and feet to go around

 

 https://twirlgoround.com/

Our neighbors had one of these and gave it to us when they got too big for it. I tried and tried to find one for my kids, and I finally found a name for the four-seater one, but it wasn't made anymore!

This was fabulous. 

[DawnM]

Not sure if I can explain this well, but at my school we had several in-ground trampolines.   They were about 6x6 square and were made with old tire strips that were woven together and created a bouncing area.   When the strips got worn out was the most fun as we used to see how long we could go without falling through.

When the strips were completely worn out, we would use the hole as a fort.

We also had a huge zip line.

[DreamerGirl]

My school had slide and what we called jungle gym for very small children. The older kids had to run and play. Parks were not a very big thing then like now.

But pretty much every house had a swing. A huge one in the middle of the house that was as long and wide as a twin bed I would say. A fully grown adult could lay down and sleep on it without falling.

I have always had a thing for swings ever since and even now I have porch swings, swing chairs both indoor and outdoor. I always love the feeling of swinging.

I always love and loved games that involve lots of running or ball games. But swings are something I have a thing for even now. I don't think I will ever outgrown them.

[LaughingCat]

My favorite was something like that "giant stride" only ours had 2 swings attached to it instead of the hanging on things.

[PaxEtLux]

I have to ask:  As long as I can remember, I've loathed merry-go-rounds, and any playground equipment that would create dizziness, as when I would get dizzy, I would immediately get very, very unpleasant headaches and nausea, and need to lie down on the ground for 15 minutes to recover.  None of the other kids would ever seem to be quite so strongly impacted, so I've never been one to go on merry-go-rounds or other like equipment.  It always struck me as bizarre that so many playgrounds would have these devices of pain on them, but I guess few people have this reaction?

[Tree Frog]

I loved merry go rounds and swings. One of the local merry go rounds was built in a hole. I remember a kid falling off, rolling underneath it, and being stuck until it came to at a complete stop and someone helped him out.

We also had huge tires the kids could sit inside of. It was usually where the popular kids hung out, so I didn't go in very often.

[theelfqueen]

The kind of slide that is built into a hillside. 

[MercyA]

5 hours ago, PaxEtLux said:

I have to ask:  As long as I can remember, I've loathed merry-go-rounds, and any playground equipment that would create dizziness, as when I would get dizzy, I would immediately get very, very unpleasant headaches and nausea, and need to lie down on the ground for 15 minutes to recover.  None of the other kids would ever seem to be quite so strongly impacted, so I've never been one to go on merry-go-rounds or other like equipment.  It always struck me as bizarre that so many playgrounds would have these devices of pain on them, but I guess few people have this reaction?

I would get dizzy, but it wasn't unpleasant and it didn't cause nausea or headaches. I feel for you! 

[Stacia]

Swings. Especially to swing as high as possible, then leap off when reaching the top of the arc in order to jump/land far away.

[NewnameC]

A giraffe.

It was a climbing structure. I can’t really describe it, so I searched for an image.

It was similar to this one.

 

[MercyA]

@NewnameC, that is really neat! I would have loved him, too. 🙂 

[KatieJ]

Dating myself here…

when I was in grade school, our playground had tar under the teeter totter….and I fell of, knocked the wind out of me. Not sure I ever got on it again.

I loved and was terrified of the slide that was way too tall…

Swings felt amazing..freeing. 
 

When I was in 3rd grade our school burned . We were housed temporarily the  last 6 weeks of school . The  next year, we were all in an old warehouse for school. It was odd and scary, and we had no where to go except our classroom or outside. I don’t recall a library and certainly no gym or lunchroom.
Our playground was the street, which they blocked off during lunch time. We played jump rope and kick ball. Our teachers must have been saints to get 8 grades thru that experience!