Fortune Teller (was Cootie catcher)

[Katie Schack]

In Southern Minnesota in the '80s, the term "cootie catcher" was used,
although the actual use of the object was usually much more similar to
telling fortunes than to catching cooties.  I don't recall the term
"fortune teller" ever being used to describe it.  I'm wondering if there
may have been another name as well, but if so I don't remember what it
was.

Katie

On Mon, 7 Aug 2000, Jessie Emerson wrote:

> The device, if we are talking about the same thing, in the '70s in North
> Alabama was also "fortune teller" and had nothing to do with catching
> cooties.  A very intricate series of physical descriptions and professions
> (for the potential mate--a very sexist game) was written on the segments of
> the fortune teller, and you chose numbers (written on the outer segments) to
> determine what segment you landed on.
>
> Jessie Emerson
> ---
> Johanna wrote:
>
> >Oddly enough, though I remember these devices perfectly from the mid 1980s
> on, and I do remember them being called cootie catchers, I don't remember
> them being used to catch cooties.  We used them mainly to tell fortunes, and
> we might have snapped at each other with them, but I think the snapping was
> just a secondary use and not necessarily intended to catch vermin.  Could
> the cootie catching have lessened and using them to tell fortunes increased
> with time, or was my school an anomaly?
>