18 Crazy Stories From The Days When Kids Could Run Around Unsupervised
Childhood was different in days gone by. Technology was different. Neighborhoods were different. Parenting was different. As a result, a lot of kids were going around unsupervised and getting themselves into situations they're luckly they survived. These folks hopped on the Reddit forum r/AskReddit to answer the question: "What unsupervised childhood activities did you participate in, that probably should have killed you?" Posts have been lightly edited for language and clarity.
- 1297 VOTES
Before Paintball
From Redditor u/time2downshift
Before paintball, we only had BB guns to shoot at one another. Needless to say, there weren’t any fancy face masks or other protective gear.
From Redditor u/bagpiper
Forty years later, my parents were finally told the story of me using a pocket knife to remove the BB embedded in my kid brothers butt cheek.
- 2305 VOTES
Tree Riding
From Redditor u/Babydontcomeback
Tree riding. Climb a tree and have your friends cut it down. We would have contests to see who would climb the highest. I won more than once. I cannot fathom how I nor anyone else was not seriously hurt, never mind killed.
- 3324 VOTES
Roller Blades + Roof + Trampoline
From Redditor u/Melrob17
I used to rollerblade off the roof and onto the trampoline. It hurts to think about it now. I'm still shocked I never got hurt!
- 4247 VOTES
Tarzan Swing Over The Ravine
From Redditor u/GeneralLoofah
I used to have free reign in the woods behind the base housing at Fort Bragg. My friends and I would ride our bikes through the woods for hours in the summer at the tender age of 7 like it wasn’t a big deal. I’d never let my 7-year-old wander around the woods like that nowadays. One day, we found a vine that was dangling next to a ravine and did a Tarzan swing across it. It was probably a good 30-foot drop to the bottom of a pit filled with jagged rock and dubious puddles of ick. I wasn’t supposed to show my parents, but I did one day and they freaked out and cut it down. My friends were mad at me for like a minute until they all agreed it was indeed incredibly dangerous and for the best. Perhaps the most logical conclusion I have ever seen kids come to in my life.
- 5303 VOTES
Brake Fluid And Chlorine
From Redditor u/Narcslayer714
My greatest discovery at around 12 years old was finding out brake fluid and chlorine for the pool combust when mixed. Soon, my friends and I were doing all kinds of crazy [stuff] with the mixture. The best was driving a pipe into the ground a few feet long and putting the chlorine and brake fluid in there and watching the dragon fire shoot out the pipe. It's not an immediate reaction, kind of a slow burn 'til it bursts into a furious hellfire.
- 6324 VOTES
Leaping On Unsuspecting Horses
From Redditor u/Albanian_Tea
When I was a kid, we used to toss apples under the tree, climb the tree, and when the horses that my grandparents raised would come to eat the apples, we would leap on the horses. Most of the time, the horse would buck and take off running with a kid on its back.