The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1904-05-29

! evidence in the swings or on the merry
go-round. or picnicking under the trees OF
Military Park the company is as a whole
an exceedingly well-behaved lot
SOME ONE IN CHARGE.
The children and the playground are
looked after by kindergartner Mrs.
Orinda Stockdale. and a matron, Mrs.
Tabitha Hayes. who alternate so that the
park is never left without chaperon. 1t
is easy enough to find either one of them
on occasion; if you are strange to the park
and have to ask. any of the children will
tell you.
"Oh she just walks round and round the
maypole all the time" That was the ex-
plicit direction of one small maid scurry-
ing homeward along the walk in the park
Walking round the Maypole is not the ex-
elusive occupation of either the matron or
the Kindergarten, but the small girls di-
rection is sufficiently definite TO enable even
a pilgrim and a stranger to find the one
or the other. The Maypoles, of which
there are four, are among the most pop
ular things on the playground and they
are always surrounded by a bevy of eager
girls and boys. The Maypoles are fitted
up not with unsubstantial ribbons, but with
stout ropes, which are attached to a ball
bearing apparatus at the top and when each
rope is grasped at the lower end by a girl
a boy and the thing set in motion the
graspers can either swing rapidly around
the circle high in the air, accord
ing to their own ideas.
The swingers depart from the usual May
pole idea in that there is no pairing of
masculine and feminine Maypolers. Either
the Maypole is in the possession of the
gentle sex or else it belongs exclusively to
fl1E nEdG Of
THE girls has had the Maypole mos all
afternoon-please, kin us boys have it
now?' is the humble request of one eager
faced youngster. The powers are inclined
to favor his request, so the girls asked
to give up the pole to their brothers. They
do ii readiiy-that is one of the incest
things about the playground; there is little
kicking against the pricks of authority,
and then they cluster round to watch the
boys swing the Maypole.
Pooh, the boys can't go near as high
as us girls can, says one saucy little maid (;
and she is right about it, too. The little
girls skim so high that one holds his
breath at times fearful of a sudden drop.
The boys, clumsier and heavier, merely
scud along the ground swinging off now
and then just for variety. That's cause
girls is limberer than boys" returns an
other small damsel with sage complacency.
The boys stick to the Maypole only a few
minutes at a time. Man-like, having at
tanned it, ii loses its destinations: and five
minutes after the pleading request for the
pole the masculine swingers have dropped
away and the flying ropes are again in the
possession of the light light-footed
little maids. The see-saws are almost as
dear TO the heart of playground childhood
the Maypoles, only over in the play
ground they don't call them see-saws.
Come on over here, Edith" shrlls one
gingham-fr ocked morsel, I've got teeter-
totter' Some of the teeter-totters are big
single ones and others have two or three
in "a row-saw-horses arranged for the
wide planks that they cannot slip in
the manner of the teeter-totters some of us