Kids today might find this hard to believe, but there really was a period in time when smartphones didn't exist. But how did they entertain themselves?. How did they survive without instant and constant access to hilarious videos of cats being cats and people failing at stuff?
Well, actually, they managed just fine. Check out these vintage pictures of children enjoying themselves before mobile phones were invented to see what we mean. Compiled by Bored Panda, the list serves as an important reminder that all you really need to enjoy yourself is a little bit of imagination. Don't forget to vote for your favorite!
This post may include affiliate links.
Girl Playing For Her Dog
Children In A Manchester Street Find Their Own Enjoyment With The Aid Of A Rope And A Lamp Post, 1946
Children Playing "Push The Peanut", King's Cross Street London, 1938
Best Friends
Girl Dancing In Front Of Her Teddy Bear, Paris, 1961
Two Little Kids Dancing On The Streets Of New York City, 1940s
Paul Remos, A Circus Strongman, Hoists His Son Up In The Air Using Only His Right Arm To Feed A Giraffe At The London Zoo, 1950s
Three Boys Are Fishing For Change During The Great Depression, New York, 1930
Even The Dog Gets A Go On This See-Saw, Northamptonshire
Kids Playing With Skippy Balls, London
Child Hung Up On A Clothing Rope, Paris
Two Girls Ride Sheep
Children Drawing With Chalk, Manchester, 1966
Kids Dancing In The Street, New York, 1964
A Young Boy Wearing An Indian Headdress Hides In A Coal Hole And Takes Aim With A Toy Pistol, London, 1954
Children Playing, New York, 1940s
Police Officer Playing With Children, Harlem, 1978
Two Boys Engrossed In Their Comic Books, Outside On The Street, 1952
Catching Rain
Ten-Year-Old Martin Witter Watches Two Snails Race In His Home In Lynwood, California, 1954
Nun Dancing With Children On Saint Patrick's Day, Ireland, 1964
Girls On Swings
Tuba Players, New York, 1940s
Girls Doing Handstands, Southam Street, London, 1956
The Little Marilyn, Paris 1975
Children Playing With Paper Boats, Paris, 1950
This Girl From Finchley, North London, Shows No Fear Of Being Dropped By Her Two Friends As They Play, 1954
Young Daughters Of Air Raid Wardens In South-east London Practising First Aid With The Aid Of Their Dolls, 1940
A Group Of Children In The Middle Of A Haystack In A Field In Pawling, New York, Early 20th Century
Children Playing Marbles, Missouri, 1940s
Russian Child Plays On Homemade Swing Made On A German Cannon Left Behind, 1944
Children Playing In Paris Under The Eiffel Tower
Girl In Japan, 1958
Children Playing, Ribeira, Porto
Children Leaping With Umbrella, 1963
Kids Keeping Cool In The Summer, New York, 1937
Children Playing In The Housing Slums Of Gorbals District, South Bank Of The River Clyde, Glasgow, 1960s
The Little Parisian, 1952
Youngster Playing In Water From Fire Hydrant. Police Are Waging Campaign Against Indiscriminate Opening Of Hydrants Since It Reduces Water Pressure And Poses A Threat To Fire Fighters, New York, 1959
Children Fishing In Victoria Park, London, 1953
Children Singing In A Snow Cave, Niigata Prefecture, 1956
An Eye On The Street, Glasgow, 1968
Boys Skateboarding In Streets Of New York, 1960s
A Group Of Boys Aged Between 8 - 14 Out At Play
Children Balance On Rail In South Dakota, 1959
Girls Playing With Their Skirts On An Air Vent
Boys Riding The Rails After The Liberation Of Holland, 1945
A Us Soldier Helps Some Children With Their Skipping, England, 1944
Two Girls Swing On A Lampost, Manchester, 1965
Children Walking Rue Marcelin Berthelin Berthelot, Choisy Le Roi Mai, Paris, 1946
German Kids Flying A Kite Made Of Worthless Money During Hyperinflation, 1923
Children Playing With A Bike Wheel, Palermo, 1971
Children Playing With Stacks Of Hyperinflated Currency During The Weimar Republic, 1922
Girls Playing, Barcelona, 1958
Two Children Have Great Fun Hanging Upside Down Off A Low Rail In Stockport, 1966
Kids Play With Boxes
Children Looking At Billboard Adds, New York, 1950s
Girls Playing Hopscotch In The Street, New York, 1947
Two Girls Playing In Sydney Slums, Mainly Surry Hills, Woolloomooloo, Redfern, 1949
Youngsters Play In Harlem Street In The 1920's
Young Boys Swinging From A Lamp Post In The Midst Of Rubble Left By A Bombing Raid On London During The Blitz, 1940
Kids Play In The Street, New York, 1900s
Two Girls Play With Their Tricycles, 1920s
London Children Wear Their Gas Masks As They Skip In The Park At Their Temporary Homes On The South Coast Of England, 1940
Children Playing A Game Of Leap-frog In A Street In Harlem, New York, 1935
Girls Peeping
Children In Swansea Make The Most Of This Climbing Frame, 1939
German Kids Playing On A Panther Tank Turret Following The Fall Of Berlin, 1945
Children Playing On Waste Ground, Middlesbrough, England, 1976
Girls Playing, Italy, 1954
Children Climbing Walls, Amsterdam, 1964
Children Playing With Toy Guns, Rome, 1951
Kids Playing On Rue Edmond-Flamand, Paris, 1952
Kids Play In A Fort, New York
Fifteen Children Enjoy A Ride In London's Bloomsbury
Children Peeping Through The Window
Boy Climbing A Pole, Paris
Two Boys Playing At Water's Edge With Toy Sailboat, 1930
Girls Jump Rope In Zennor Road, London, 1960s
Pupils Walking On Rue De Rivoli, Paris, 1978
Kids Playing In A Fire Hydrant, New York, 1954
Children Playing In An Area Of Bomb-damaged Wasteground In Stepney, In The East End Of London, 9th March 1946
Children Playing, New York, 1940s
Two Young Girls Play A Campbell Soup Kid Doll, New York, 1912
A View Of Children Playing Hopscotch In The Street In Spanish Harlem, 1965
Children Playing With Sleigh In The Snow, Oxford, 1903
Three Children Playing Golf With Clubs Made Of Sticks, 1905
Young Boys Playing Stickball In Vacant Lot Next To An Apartment Building, New York, 1947
Kids Splashing Water, New York, 1942
Children Balancing On A Wall, France, 1949
Children Playing At The Berlin Wall Near Bernauer Strasse. The Three Boys Are Climbing Up The Wall And Moving Along A Barbed Wire Fence Alongside The Wall Hand By Hand, 1963
Children Playing Cricket In A London Street, With The Wicket Drawn On A Lamppost, 1930
Girls’ Playground, Harriet Island, 1905
Children Play In The Gutter In The Southern Section Of The Bronx During The Great Depression, New York, 1936
Boys Posing For A Photo
Children Playing In London's Bethnal Green Area, 1949-52
A Group Of German Children Playing War, 1915
Playing Cricket On Wasteground In Manchester, 1970
Children Play In Slum Housing Area In Hulme, Manchester, 1946
Kindergarten Children Playing With Plasticine, 1910
Children Playing In The Streets, Paris
These Young Neapolitans Like The Danger Of The Strictly-forbidden Practise Of Hanging Onto The Backs Of Street Cars, 1948
Group Of Gleichen Boys Playing In Rubber Tires, Alberta, 1920s
Girl Playing Stickball, New York, 1947
Kids Play During Recess In School
Game At A Girls' Orphanage, Naples, 1948
Brooklyn Boy Gang, New York, 1946
Young Boys Hitch A Ride, London, 1941
Children In A Street, Paris, 1953
Kids Playing In Water After Busting A Hydrant, New York, 1953
It's not just that there are no smart phones. It is also the fact that modern parents are way too overprotective, and too many of those activities would horrify most of them. All that climbing, jumping... and toy guns? Oh, the horror (and that's called sarcasm, in case you didn't get it!)
I once threw a small seventh birthday party for my daughter when we had an evergreen tree with very low branches. My kids and two of my daughter's friends were in the tree very low when their parents arrived to pick them up and both sets of parents just freaked out that I let them in a tree. The parents didn't even have to reach up for them. They were literally low enough that a parent just reached over and plucked them like goofy fruit from the branch. I felt very sad for those children.
Load More Replies...these are the same kids who grew up and set rules on the next generation of kids.......
We can't blame technology for kids not playing outside. Parents today are WAY to over protective. the term "helicopter pa
When I was a kid in the 1950s they warned we'd all end up with "TV legs" from not getting enough exercise...
Load More Replies...It's not just that there are no smart phones. It is also the fact that modern parents are way too overprotective, and too many of those activities would horrify most of them. All that climbing, jumping... and toy guns? Oh, the horror (and that's called sarcasm, in case you didn't get it!)
I once threw a small seventh birthday party for my daughter when we had an evergreen tree with very low branches. My kids and two of my daughter's friends were in the tree very low when their parents arrived to pick them up and both sets of parents just freaked out that I let them in a tree. The parents didn't even have to reach up for them. They were literally low enough that a parent just reached over and plucked them like goofy fruit from the branch. I felt very sad for those children.
Load More Replies...these are the same kids who grew up and set rules on the next generation of kids.......
We can't blame technology for kids not playing outside. Parents today are WAY to over protective. the term "helicopter pa
When I was a kid in the 1950s they warned we'd all end up with "TV legs" from not getting enough exercise...
Load More Replies...
