The April, 1957 issue of Mechanix Illustrated predicted that New York's slum children would escape "gang wars, fiercely fought with knives and zip-guns" by moving to high rooftop baseball diamonds:
There, a few yards from the tenements where they live, on their very roofs, in fact, is a regulation-size baseball diamond with real springy turf! But the kids aren’t interested just now–they played ball all afternoon. Instead, they enter the locker room and in a few minutes are cavorting noisily in a big, broad and very cool swimming pool. Afterwards, they troop onto the ball field, where chairs have been set up, and watch a movie under the stars.What’s it all about? “This magic land for kids doesn’t exist in my city,” you say. No, it doesn’t–yet!
But it darn well could! It could exist in your town and in hundreds of other communities throughout the nation. Every city could construct huge, all-encompassing playgrounds and recreation centers, using the enormous, readily available space now going completely to waste on the rooftops of their congested areas!
PLAYGROUNDS IN THE SKY (Apr, 1957)
