[ Home ] [ Books ] [ Search Inquiry ] [ Contents ]
Chip Stone
[ Home ] [ Up ]

By Dan Beard

In the gravel-pit or somewhere along the river, creek, lake, or sea-shore may be found disk-shaped stones called "skippers " or "sailors," because the boys can make them sail through the air or skip over the surface of the water.  These stones are used for counters in the game of Chip Stone.  The pure white or semi-transparent skippers, about the size of an old-fashioned copper cent, are the kind selected.

A bull ring about five feet in diameter is made on the ground, or two taw lines about five feet apart are drawn on the sidewalk, and each boy, as in marbles, "lays in" a counter.  If the game is on the sidewalk the skippers are placed in a row between the two taw lines.  If in a bull ring the stones are placed in a small circle in the center of the ring.

In turn each player spins his top and plugs at the skippers in the ring or between the taw lines; if his top fails to spin he "lays in " another skipper.

If his top "dies," that is, stops spinning inside the ring, he "lays in" another stone.  But if his top spins as it should he takes it up on a little wooden shovel and drops it so that the peg hits the edge of a counter; he continues to scoop up and drop the top so long as it will spin, or until it has knocked a counter over the taw line or outside the ring, in which case, as in marbles, he has another turn.

Chip Stone is really a game of marbles in which sailors or skippers are used for ducks and tops are used for taws.  Of course each boy takes great pride in his collection of trophies, each of which he considers as a medal won by his superior skill as a top spinner.  No clumsy, awkward top spinner can hope to have many sailors in his pocket unless he hunts them in the gravel pit in place of competing for them at the bull ring or between the taw lines.

Outdoor Handy Book

Search  Inquiry Net

[ Back ] [ Home ] [ Up ] [ Next ]

Additional Books

Site Contents
[Warning: Large File]

Additional Information:

Peer- Level Topic Links:
[ How to Spin ] [ Bait ] [ Chip Stone ] [ Home-Made ] [ Shovels & Whips ]

Parent- Level Topic Links:
[ Kite Making Plans ] [ Marble Games ] [ Marble Basics ] [ Stilts ] [ Tops ] [ Fish Bait ] [ Fish Sense ] [ Hoops & Wheels ] [ Pet Frogs ] [ Sucker ] [ Balloons ]

The Inquiry Net Main Topic Links:
[ Traditional Scouting ] [ BSA to B-P Dictionary ] [ Adult Association ] [ Advancement ] [ Ideals ] [ Leadership ] [ Outdoors ] [ Patrol Method ] [ Personal Growth ] [ Uniforms ]

External Sponsor Links:

Search Amazon.Com:

Dead Bugs, Blow Guns, Sharp Knives, & Snakes:
What More Could A Boy Want?

Click on Underlined Green text to follow a hyperlink.  Let me know if you find a broken link, especially those that reference a hard drive :-/

Click on Small Pictures to Enlarge Them.  
If this enlarged picture won't print on a single page, search your software for a printing option like "Best Fit."  This is the default setting in most browsers.  
If the pictures are missing, send me the URL, and I'll scan them for you.  

To Email me, replace "(at)" below with "@"
Rick(at)Kudu.Net
If you have questions, you must send me the URL!
The URL tells me what page you're talking about.  This URL is sometimes called the "Address" and it is usually found in a little box near the top of your screen.  Most URLs start with the letters "http://"
Did I mention that you must send me the URL?

©2003, The Inquiry Net, www.inquiry.net: In addition to any Copyright still held by the original authors, the Scans, Optical Character Recognition, extensive Editing,  and HTML Coding on this Website are the property of the Webmaster, Rick Seymour.   My work may be used freely by individuals for non-commercial, non-web-based activities, such as Scouting, research, teaching, and personal use so long as this copyright statement is included in the text. 

The purpose of this Website is to provide access  to hard to find, out-of-print documents.  Much of the content has been edited to be of practical use in today's world and is not intended as historical preservation.   I will be happy to provide scans of specific short passages in the original documents for people involved in academic research.  

The Kudu Net is a backup "mirror" of The Inquiry Net.  When linking to this Website, note that pages that end in "inquiry.net" are updated far more often than the corresponding "kudu.net" versions.

Old School Scouting:
What to Do, and How to Do It!

Since August 24, 2002
+550,762

Last modified: May 01, 2005.