Give your preschool child a deck of playing cards. Nothing. Give your child a small wastepaper basket. Still nothing. Now give your child both of these at the same time, and stand back.

FLIP – SHOOO, SHOOO, SHOOO. Miss.
FLIP – WHOSH, FWAP-FWAP. Miss.
FLIP – FEWWW, FWAP, FEWWW. CLINK. “Yes! Two points.”

With playing cards and a wastebasket, children are entertained for hours, reacting to the unpredictable flight of the cards as they cut through the air like high-tech flying saucers. No one can predict whether a card will go into the receptacle; they defy all aerospace principles.

Seemingly, this pastime is just another trivial diversion for children, however, I understand—although I can’t confirm any of it—that this pleasure has quite a history of fable and folklore. For instance:

1. Hoyt Wilhelm, the great knuckleball pitcher, was just another mediocre fastball pitcher, until he applied the principles of this game to perfect his great pitch.
2. On rainy days, Wilbur and Orville worked inside, using this pastime to observe aero principles, and ultimately applied them to their aircraft development.
3. A chapter from one of Hoyle’s books, described this game, entitled, “Cards Not According To Hoyle.”
4. Wham-O, the toy-maker got its inspiration for the Frisbee, from this game.
5. Lewis Carrol? That’s right. Rumor has it that this amusement, not mind-altering experimentation inspired his Queen of Hearts scene in Alice In Wonderland.
6. Houdini, because unfortunately he could not master this card skill, chose instead to became a Master of Escape, which ultimately led to his demise.
7. I believe a group of couch potatoes have formed a committee petitioning this sport to become part of the next Olympic Games.

Oh yes, I almost forgot. Dr. Naismith was influenced greatly by the pastime, which inspired him to invent the game of basketball; however, I do believe it was one or two years before he gave up the idea of dribbling cards.

Rex Bowlby is the father of two boys. He is the author of the book, Why Would I Want the Toy, When I Can Have the Box? (101 Ways to Make the Most of Your Children, With the Least from Your Wallet*) *For parents with children ages 3-8. He lives in Los Angeles, California, USA.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, October 1st, 2006 at 2:06 pm and is filed under 03-05 yrs: Preschooler, 05-12 yrs: Schooler, Crafts and Activities. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.