cootie catcher

[Laurence Horn]

At 7:31 AM -0700 8/6/00, storkrn wrote:
>original message:
>
>>  >I recently encountered a device made of folded paper, that grade school
>>  >kids used for telling fortunes (when I was one.)
>>
>>
>>  Wow, haven't thought about those for years.  But I *never* heard the
>>  term cootie catcher.  I can't remember what, if anything in
>>  particular we called it, but it wasn't cootie catcher.  NYC in the
>>  50s.
>>
>>  RIma
>
>In central Connecticut in the 1950's I never heard of cootie catcher but I
>did hear of "flippers" as in: "If you children don't put those flippers away
>you will stay in during recess!"
>
>Sharyn Hay


Well, here and now in southern Connecticut, my daughter (now 15)
spontaneously gave just "fortune tellers" for these grand school
devices, but when prodded to come up with another name that other
people used, did offer cootie catcher, so it's still around and
evidently spreading a bit.

Larry