Watching the nearly incomprehensible (for me anyway) Olympic men’s short course team speed skating event on the television prompted me to do research that and find out it’s the forty fifth anniversary of the invention of 43-Man Squamish.
For (mostly) men of a certain age, 43-Man Squamish is a favorite game. Back in the day, I played both Shallow Brooder and Half Frummert, something of a rarity. Invented by Tom Koch of Mad Magazine, I heard Squamish was under consideration as a Olympic sport, but lost out to Mass Start Biathlon and Air Rifle.
It’s not as well known in the USA as in some parts of the world, so some Boing Boing readers are possibly only marginally familiar with it. Squamish is a full-contact, sometimes dangerous game played on a five sided field (the Flutney) by players using a long forked stick (the frullip) to smack around a special ball (the pritz.) More squamish rules and details are available here.