Mumbletypeg

Mumbletypeg is an outdoor game played by children using pocketknives. Mumbletypeg was very popular as a schoolyard game in the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries, but with increased concern over child safety the game has declined in popularity. The game continued as a popular activity at summer camps into the 1970s but declined with the rise of video games. The term "Mumbletypeg" came from the practice of putting a peg of about 2 or 3 inches into the ground. The loser of the game had to take it out with his teeth.

Mumbletypeg involves tossing a pocketknife into the ground in a progressively more difficult competition usually limited to two players. If the knife tossed by a player does not stick in the bare ground, the player loses his/her turn. Beyond these basics, the rules varied greatly according to location.

Some versions of the game involved a series of about a dozen progressively more difficult trick tosses. For example, after first tossing the knife right and left for a 1/2-turn in the air from the open palm of each hand, the next step is to toss it similarly from the closed fist of each upward-turned hand. The third turn, with the knife laying on the back of the hand pointing away from the player, is to flip it up 270 degrees and down into the dirt. Fourth was "Spank the Baby": holding the blade flat between the first two fingers of one hand, the knife handle was "spanked" with the other hand causing the knife to flip up 270 degrees and stick into the ground. The knife had to always stick into the ground securely enough to put two fingers under it. "Tip of the fingers" was another turn, with the knife being required to stick in the ground after doing a somersault off the tip of each index finger (and thumb, to hold the tip), and a subsequent turn was "Tony Chestnut" where the knife was similarly flipped off the toe, the knee, the chest and the forehead (nut). Another turn was "Over the fence". The knife was just barely stuck into the ground, leaning over to the right or left. The player's free hand made a "fence" and the knife was slapped up and "over the fence" with the other hand. It had to flip completely at least once, then come down sticking in the ground with the accepted "two fingers" clearance. In some versions, this turn was last, called "Over the Fence is Out" and the winner was the player who got "over the fence" first. Another trial was standing with the knife in ones hand, tip pointing away, then throwing the knife over ones head backwards and having it stick in the ground.

Mark Twain's book "Tom Sawyer, Detective" recounts mumbletypeg as one of boys' favorite outdoor games.

External links

* [http://ruskfamily.com/jimrusk/PocketKGames.html A recollection of playing mumbletypeg]
* [http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~glenntunneycolumn/column314.htm "Pocket Knife Games Were Popular Pastimes" by Glenn Tunney] described a game called “Pocket Knife Baseball”
* [http://www.rootsweb.com/~iaohms/schools/school_memories.html "Memories from Country School Days" by Dorothy (Carlson) Girvan] also has a brief mention of playing mumbledepeg.