Week Forty-Eight: Street Carnival

Carnival.

Oh, what a joyful word to kids’ ears. Carnival. Cotton candy and scary carnies. The lure of winning a horridly ugly stuffed dog by throwing balls or tossing rings. The thrill of getting lost followed by the inexplicable joy of being found again. And a chance to watch Dad go ballistic when he has to pay $3.50 each when you and your two brothers want hot dogs.

Cokesbury, too, is in a carnival spirit. Behold:

A good way to make money for any worthy enterprise is to have a Street Carnival.

Yeah, making money again. I wasn’t aware that carnivals existed for any other purpose than paying for additional tattoos or having yet another excuse to avoid going to the dentist. But Cokesbury seems to think you can make money by hosting one, preferably indoors so you can filter out the riff-raff, especially when your advert for the carnival is so damned compelling:

Christian Endeavor Street Carnival

Friday Evening, October 10.

A lot of fun for all.

Admission, 25 cents.

Or, alternately:

Big Street Carnival

Tuesday night at eight o’clock.

Come one, come all.

Under the auspices of the Conference Club

Admission, 15 cents.

Kinda reminds me of this:

Wow. “Stimulant properties of the coca plant.” Yeah, before they changed the formula, Coca-Cola was basically liquid cocaine. But since it was a “Syrup*And*Extract,” that took the curse off it.

Anyway, back to the publicity. I love this gem:

The newspapers should have two or three stories about it.

Wow, they were pushovers for a good carnival story back then, were they? Of course, this is back when people actually did read newspapers. And back when folks like George Babbitt could manipulate a reporter at will. Such as:

When the Sunday School campaign was finished, Babbitt suggested to Kenneth Escott, "Say, how about doing a little boosting for Doc Drew personally?"

Escott grinned. "You trust the doc to do a little boosting for himself, Mr. Babbitt! There's hardly a week goes by without his ringing up the paper to say if we'll chase a reporter up to his Study, he'll let us in on the story about the swell sermon he's going to preach on the wickedness of short skirts, or the authorship of the Pentateuch. Don't you worry about him. There's just one better publicity-grabber in town, and that's this Dora Gibson Tucker that runs the Child Welfare and the Americanization League, and the only reason she's got Drew beaten is because she has got SOME brains!"

"Well, now Kenneth, I don't think you ought to talk that way about the doctor. A preacher has to watch his interests, hasn't he? You remember that in the Bible about—about being diligent in the Lord's business, or something?"

"All right, I'll get something in if you want me to, Mr. Babbitt, but I'll have to wait till the managing editor is out of town, and then blackjack the city editor."

Thus it came to pass that in the Sunday Advocate-Times, under a picture of Dr. Drew at his earnestest, with eyes alert, jaw as granite, and rustic lock flamboyant, appeared an inscription—a wood-pulp tablet conferring twenty-four hours' immortality:

The Rev. Dr. John Jennison Drew, M.A., pastor of the beautiful Chatham Road Presbyterian Church in lovely Floral Heights, is a wizard soul-winner. He holds the local record for conversions. During his shepherdhood an average of almost a hundred sin-weary persons per year have declared their resolve to lead a new life and have found a harbor of refuge and peace.

Everything zips at the Chatham Road Church. The subsidiary organizations are keyed to the top-notch of efficiency. Dr. Drew is especially keen on good congregational singing. Bright cheerful hymns are used at every meeting, and the special Sing Services attract lovers of music and professionals from all parts of the city.

On the popular lecture platform as well as in the pulpit Dr. Drew is a renowned word-painter, and during the course of the year he receives literally scores of invitations to speak at varied functions both here and elsewhere.

Yeah, your modern-day newspaper reporters love stuff like that. Call them. Several times. See how many times you’ll be completely ignored.

No matter. Your guests will be battering down your street carnival doors, two bits in hand, waiting for admission so they can see the attractions you’re going to nickel-and-dime them for. Better get going. Here are a few suggestions:

Museum. Have one booth arranged as a museum. A charge of admission of 5 or 10 cents should be made. Some of the following may be placed in the museum:

September Morn (a card bearing the date September 1, 5 am)
The light of the World (a box of matches)
A collection of marble (just some marbles)
Some things out of King Tut’s tomb (anything that has never been in King Tut’s tomb)
The Home of Burns (use a smoothing iron)
Portrait of Penn (a picture of a writing pen)
The Watch on the Rhine (a watch on an orange peel)
A twelve-carat ring (make this with a dozen carrots, placed in a circle)
The One-Eyed Monster (a sewing needle)

For Men Only. The booth for men only should be an attraction for the ladies. But it may be required that when women are admitted they have to go in pairs or be accompanied by a gentleman friend. The booth merely contains articles used exclusively by men. A razor, men’s trousers, leather belt, socks, tie, etc.

For Women Only. The men should be admitted only in pairs or with a lady. The booth contains articles used exclusively by women such as a dress, hose, high-heeled shoes, lip stick, corset, etc. A small admission should be charged.

Here, it’s not clear whether Cokesbury expects men to be the only sex willing to see what’s for women only, or if women are too smart to pay to see the crap their husbands or boyfriends leave lying all over the house or apartment. Either way, just try charging only for the Women’s Tent and see how well that goes over with your feminist friends.

There are more booths, however. Let’s continue:

Wild Animals and Birds. Select people with names of animals and birds for this booth, such as Mr. Fox, Miss Lyon, Mrs. Wolf, etc. Other names that are common are Hare, Bear, Beaver, Crabb. Names of birds are Crow, Drake, Sparrow, Hawk, and Martin. If it is not possible to get people with these names, pictures of people in the city with such names may be used and the names written under the picture.

It will add to the interest at this booth if there is someone on the inside, either with a musical instrument such as a trombone, or some apparatus contrived for that purpose, making noises to represent the roar of wild animals and the squawking of birds.

I tried to think, do I know anyone named after an animal? I know a Martin. I know a little dwarf-imp-girl named after a poison gas (I don’t know why; don’t ask). Maybe this would work where you live.

To continue:

Food Booths. Quite a good deal may be realized from the sale of candy, ice-cream cones, sandwiches, coffee, and cake. If this is donated, all money received will be profit.

To go with the food booth, Cokesbury suggests:

The Green Pig that Eats Human Food. Place a mirror in the bottom of a box about a foot square. Over this box have a large green light bulb and a yellow bulb on a double socket. Charge 5 cents admission to see this show. The person looks in the box and sees his reflection in the green mirror.

If that’s not enough of a money-maker, try this one:

Mystery Fish Pond. Use an ordinary fishing pole and attach for a hook a spring clothespin or other spring snap. Arrange a curtain in such a way that the hook may be thrown over. This may be done over a partition. The customer snaps a dime for bait onto the hook and throws it over. The one in charge on the other side takes the dime and fastens a package onto the snap. Some of these articles may be of value as bait for other customers, but most of them must be valueless to assume a good profit.

Sounds like a great way to clean out lint traps, garbage pails, sink traps and other rubbish bins for the valueless junk. For the rest, just give them their dime back.

This next one, I might actually do, because in a way it reminds me of the elementary school I attended. The fire escape from the second floor WAS A FREAKING SLIDE. WAHOOO! Never got to use it, and it was removed the year I actually got to attend class on the second floor:

A Trip to Mars. The customers are blindfolded and led into the entrance of the road to Mars. Along the route they are rocked and turned in chairs, swung in swings, made to climb out of a narrow window, pass through a narrow passage, climb a ladder, and come down a slide. This slide may be arranged from a window. Care should be taken to arrange such a trip so that it will not be dangerous.

As far as I’m concerned, come do it at Lincoln Elementary School. I’m sure some janitor still has that fire escape slide stashed somewhere.

Speaking of dangerous carnival attractions, why not build your own Ferris Wheel?

The Ferris Wheel. At a church carnival I saw the Ferris wheel which I shall describe. It was strongly constructed with upright posts extending about ten feet from the ground. On either side two pieces of timber two by six inches were crossed and brace together. A hole was bored through the intersection of these timbers, and they were arrange so that they would revolve on the two-inch pipe placed on the upright posts. These two by sizes should be sixteen feet long. At each of the four ends of the timbers seats are hung on three-fourth-inch pipes to that they will revolve. The wheel must be strongly constructed. It is operated by three or four boys, and particularly for the amusement of children. If strongly constructed, grown-ups may patronize it also.

If it were me, I’d stick with the mission to Mars. Remember, describing a home-made Ferris Wheel is a lot different than building such a wheel. Maybe you ought to wait for Popular Mechanics to come out with a set of plans.

Or just do it this way:

Be sure to play some appropriate 1930s music. Like this:

Next you need a sop to throw to the folks who are getting tired of digging into their pockets every time they wander up to a booth. Enter the Free Show:

Usually in every city there is someone who does acrobatic stunts, or tumbling stunts, or someone who performs on the horizontal bar, or trapeze, or plays a violin in some unusual way. Use any of such acts that can be secured for the free show.

Call Ned Flanders. He’s got that stupid sexy butt thing going:

And that’s it, folks. Show’s over, except for this newspaper article as reproduced by Cokesbury, describing such a fair, one which evidently went a long way in fostering improved race relations in the Greater Palm Beach, Florida, area:

It was Whoopee Night last night in the vicinity of the Northwood Church, when the great Whoopee Carnival being staged by the young people of the church was open to the public for the fist run. A huge crowd was there. Everybody was in gay spirits and took in everything that was offered, both in the way of entertainment and refreshments. The carnival runs again tonight. Besides the Main Show, which was a splendid program beginning at eight o’clock, there were two trapeze performers and side shows, including a ten-year-old negro boy weighing 450 pounds, fortune telling, a green pig, a reducing lady, a freak palm reading, and fish pond. Then the Ferris Wheel attracted old folks and young alike, while the watermelon booth, were you could get a slice for a nickel and all you could eat for a dime, the ice-cream stand, the hot dog counter, and so and so on, were busy places every minute of the evening.

Yes, my journalist friends, that is all one paragraph. Remember this the next time you criticize the Internet for being a vapid cesspool of poor journalistic endeavor.

And, frankly, speaking as a fat person, I've never understood why fat people are considered freaks or funny. As noted earlier on this blog, I never cared for the "Our Gang" character Chubbsy-Wubbsy, or the infinite other fatty derivatives out there meant to draw humor. I file fat kids in the same category I file monkeys -- and that is in the very narrow category of things that are considered amusing but really aren't, before you get any radical ideas. And having a fat negro kid? Yeah, Florida, really improving on the race relations thing, right?

So on that note, we leave the carnival and its freaks behind. Tune in next week when the party will vanish. Literally.

Week Thirty-Six: Fifty Party

Cokesbury maybe possibly hints that some of your more conservative guests might, well, have a problem with this party, as it involves (whisper) dice. Personally, I’ve never understood why some people are shy of dice. What are they aside from being black-and-white polyhedral objects used in a wide variety of games?

Well, there’s the Flanders View:

Lisa: Where are the dice?
Todd: Daddy says dice are wicked.
Rod: We just move one space at a time. It's less fun that way.

But Cokesbury, ever-faithful to the faithful set, offers this delightful anti-dice workaround:

If it is not desirable to use dice, cubes can be made at small expense from wood. Any mill could make them out of wood. Gum wood cut into blocks three-quarters inch square could be painted white with black figured on them. For fifty cents any mill would make as many as twenty-five of these, but of course would not paint them. It is not even necessary to have them painted, and the figures could be printed on with ink [or] have figures printed on them corresponding to the numbers on a dice.

In other words, if your friends are uncomfortable with playing with dice, make some cubic, black-and-white dice-like objects. But they’re not dice. Having these dice-like objects manufactured, painted and stamped to look like dice doesn’t make them dice, per se, or . . . okay, they’re dice. Tell your dice-hating friends either to suck it up, or to stay away from the party or go play with the Flanderses.

Gum wood, Cokesbury advises, is the best wood to use for making your anti-dice dice:

It will be found that in using a wood block, made from gum wood, it is almost impossible to drop the block even a distance of three inches without having it turn over.

You may learn many, many, many more of the qualities of gum wood by visiting this site, populated by a man – or at least a clip art – that resembles Harrison Ford with a Walter Matthau nose:

I’m told this is Gustav Stickley, a name you would certainly anticipate going with a mug like that. Mr. Stickley is credited with being a “leading spokesman of the American Craftsman movement,” which explains his overt fascination with gum wood.

Let me back up a little here. Several paragraphs about dice for this party, and I haven’t even explained why you need them. It’s because you’re going to play a money-making dice game – Cokesbury doesn’t express any concern about you sponging your guests for money with a dice game, note – and you’re going to need a lot of dice to do it.

You’re going to play Fifty, a dice game to be explained in a few moments. More importantly, Cokesbury wants to point out that “this party may be used as a money-making party by selling the sides of the tables at from twenty-five cents to one dollar each, depending upon the financial ability of those who are to attend.”

So let’s tote that up. If, as Cokesbury recommends, you have six to ten tables, four sides per table, that means if you go cheap and charge four bits a side for ten tables, you’re going to gross TEN WHOLE DOLLARS. If you go totally bursar and charge a dollar a side, well, buddy, your gross will be forty big ones, enough in 1932 to buy several hundred ivory-handled backscratchers.

Now that you’re totally pumped with the Vegas casino-like profits of the evening, here’s the game:

The game is scored as follows: Anything double except three and six counts five. Double three cancels all your score for that game as well as that of your partner. Partners must begin again from zero, and mark only the score then made until the whistle blows. Fifty is a game, and the object is to see who gets to fifty first. The leader blows a whistle and all start throwing. Each player gets only one throw and the cubes then pass to the left. They all play until some couple gets a score of fifty, at which time they yell “Fifty.” The game then stops, and all players add up their score for that game. If the game is too fast like this, and it is desirable to slow it up, have the whole group controlled by the head table. All must play until the head table scores fifty. This will eliminate some of the necessity for haste.

Now I’ve read this party several times. I’ve used candles and lemon juice to try to find invisible writing in the margins. But nowhere can I find what happens if, for example, one rolls a double six, or any dice combination that isn’t a double of anything. Are those rolls scored? What do double-sixes equal? I’m so confused.

Cokesbury advises that it’ll take twelve to fifteen rounds to fill the evening. After the game is over, remove your dice-like objects from the table and serve . . . cake and punch or cake and ice cream. No sandwiches. Unless you’ve got loads left over from past parties.

There you go. Now, on to next week and the Alphabet Party. Cokesbury naturally chooses the Roman alphabet, but it’s possible to modify this to Greek or Cyrillic or whatever. Unless, of course, you’ve got guests who are afraid of any letter outside the traditional twenty-six. In that case, get some more gum wood . . .

Week Thirty-Four: Indian Party

We’ve all been to parties like this, where the evening goes so entirely awkward from the first second that the party ends abruptly, early, and with an air of relief. Marge Simpson knows the feeling – she attended that infamous New Year’s Eve party at Lenny’s, “and he didn’t even have a clock.”

Cokesbury’s Indian Party is like that. It wouldn’t even be held in these politically-correct times (but if you think this is bad, wait until we present, with much trepidation, Cokesbury’s minstrel show). And although Cokesbury declaims in its introduction to this party that the “Indians were a picturesque people, and some of their manners and customs are well known to all,” it seems the only customs mentioned in the party are those you’d see in a vaudeville act about Indians in full wampum-paying, scalping, peace pipe-smoking glory.

Here’s the invitation, patterned, Cokesbury says, after Longfellow’s poem Hiawatha:

By the side of Tenth and Olive

Stands the wigwam of the princess,

And she sends to all the village

Messengers with wands of willow

A sign of invitation,

As a token of the feasting,

And she bids us all assemble

For an Indian Party, Friday

And at eight we are to gather.

With Longfellow’s romantic ode thus butchered, it’s time to move on to other incorrectness, such as costumes.

Request should be made that everyone come in Indian costume as far as possible. If costumes are not available, each guest should be provided with a feather headdress made of paper. These may either be made or secured from the March Brothers publishing Company, Lebanon, Ohio, at a low price. A blanket and beads can be worn in such a way that they make an effective costume.

In other words, try to look like these guys. (Old-timey Indian action starts at 2:14) Bonus: Watch this clip from the beginning and try to spot Jackie Coogan/Uncle Fester. And don’t get me wrong. This film, The Shakiest Gun in the West, is one of my favorites. But that doesn’t mean they depict the Indians correctly.



With your authentic Indian costumes on display, it’s time to move on to some authentic Indian games, showing that indeed, as Cokesbury says, Indian manners and customs are known by all:

Big Game Hunt. Before the guests arrived the hostess has hidden around the room animal crackers with numbers on them or animals cut out of cardboard with numbers on them. The guests are told to find them, and the tribe that finds the largest number will get a prize. Prizes for the evening may be feathers to put in the headdress. In this case each one in the tribe that finds the largest number or whose total score, taking the numbers from the animals, makes the largest total wins.

This is, of course, mirroring the fine Indian tradition of scurrying around the house looking like an idiot, trying to find animal crackers, trying not to tread on the crackers and trying not to eat the crackers before the score is tallied.

Then we move on to this game:

Indian Tribes. The guests are supplied with sheets of paper, typewritten, using carbons, or mimeographed:

What Indian tribe is
(1) A girls name? Sioux
(2) Flowing streams? Creeks
(3) Known by its caws? Crow.
(4) The name for a South Atlantic state? Delaware.
(5) Slang for “you’re wise to it.” Huron (You’re on).
(6) A vowel and an herb? Osage
(7) The lower extremities of a Negro? Blackfeet.

And we stop there. See? You’ve managed to offend two races in a single party. Care to try for a trifecta?

And note: I love the celebration of ‘modern’ technology in this game. The sheets are typewritten. And duplicated using carbons or a mimeograph. A mimeograph! How quaint.

Let’s move on to the word you’ve all been waiting for:

Squaws’ Relay. An equal number of squaws are chosen from each tribe. They stand in parallel line facing a goal. The goal is about twenty feet from the head of each line and is made by a circle drawn on the floor about eighteen inches in diameter. In this are placed five Indian clubs or Coca-Cola bottles. Each squaw runs to the circle, the first taking the clubs out of the circle, the next placing the clubs back in the circle. The tribe that finishes first wins.

Squaw squaw squaw. Once again Cokesbury presents a party meant to make progressive heads just explode.

Here’s another chance for some good old-fashioned Indian fun:

Archery Contest. Secure from the five-and-ten-cent store a bow and arrows. The target may be the usual target with circles on it, numbered so that the center circle about four inches in diameter counts twenty-five, the second circle, twenty, the third fifteen, the fourth ten, and the fifth five. The score of each one is kept and the score by tribes. A prize should be given the best individual archer and the prizes to the best tribe.

Another way to do this would be to cut from cardboard the shapes of animals, mounting these on bases so that they will stand up. Have some larger and some smaller. Graduate so that to hit the small one will count twenty-five, the next largest twenty, and next largest fifteen, and so on. Give prizes in the same manner as described above.

Just remember when you get a bunch of enthusiastic folks in the same room with archery equipment, hijinx can result. Observe:



On to something perhaps a bit more sophisticated. No more politically correct, of course.

Medicine Dance. Squares or circles are marked off on the floor in such a way that couples marching around will not be able to avoid them. Somone plays a lively tune, such as “Turkey in the Straw” and all march. When the music suddenly stops, whoever is inside a ring must take a seat. This is done by couples, and if one of the two is in the ring, both must be seated. The object is to see which couple can remain on the floor the longest. This may be done twice if it goes over well the first time and there is plenty of time.

Turkey in the Straw. That song just oozes Indian sophistication:



That’s George Rock on the trumpet, by the way.

One last game. Because Indians do a lot of hopping. And spelling, apparently.

Hopping Relay. Six contestants are selected to represent each group and are arranged in lines at one side of the room. At the opposite side of the room a large blackboard should be provided. The first contestant in each group should be given a piece of chalk and at the signal will hop on one foot to the blackboard, write the letter “I,” hop back, and hand the chalk to the second man in his line, who hops to the board and writes “N,” and continuing until the word “Indian” has been written.

And so on. Maybe after this party, you’ll understand how Chief Joseph felt:



That’s it. Time for refreshments such as apples, nuts, pop corn, and “laughing water (lemonade), wolf meat (hot dogs).”

How?

How.

Aaand be sure to tune in next week, when you’ll see the author stumble over how to present the next few parties in the book in a way that makes sense. It might not be easy. So next week might be a Measuring Party. Or it might not. Stay tuned.