Chinese Jacks
From HawaiiBase - The Hawaii Wiki
Chinese Jacks was a game played by children in Hawaii, primarily at the elementary-school level in the 1980s.
Description
Chinese Jacks is played with six "jacks." Each jack is assembled from identical, interlocking plastic rings of about 1.5 centimeters in diameter. These rings are shaped much like key-rings and are joined similarly. One ring serves as the center; the other rings of the same color are linked to the center ring.
Both boys and girls enjoyed playing Chinese Jacks at recess time on school yards all over the U.S.
In the 1980s, Chinese jacks could be purchased at most neighborhood drug stores and supermarkets, usually on the same rack as other cheap, imported toys.
Game Play and Scoring
Players (usually one to six at a time) sit in a circle on the floor. Each player chooses one jack as his or her color.
When it is a player's turn, he or she takes all six jacks in one hand and tosses them in the air, allowing the jacks to fall to the floor. The player then picks up his or her color and maneuvers the jacks, tossing some into the air while picking up others, through a series of ordered steps.
Steps are often called out as they are taken, although experienced players usually go through the steps without doing so. These steps are named "ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy, eighty, ninety, a hundred," just as in Chinese Jumprope. If at any time in the sequence, the player picks up the wrong jack, drops a jack, fails to pick a jack up, touches a jack other than the intended target, skips a step in the order, or moves any jack other than the one being picked up, he or she is "out" and the jacks are passed to the next player in the circle.
- Ten: The player tosses his or her color into the air and picks up any other jack from the floor before his or her color hits the floor.
- Twenty, thirty, forty, and fifty: The player repeats this motion, each time tossing the jack in hand while picking up another. If a player picks up a jack already used in the ten-to-fifty sequence, he or she is "out."
- Sixty: The player tosses the jack in hand into the air, picking up two jacks this time, one of which must be the player's color.
- Seventy: The player tosses the two jacks in hand into the air, picking up the remaining three before either of the two in hand hit the floor.
- Eighty: The player tosses the three jacks in hand into the air, picking up only his or her color before any of the three hit the floor.
- Ninety: The player tosses his or her color into the air, picking up all five of the others from the floor, this time catching the tossed jack before it hits the floor. The player now has all six jacks in hand.
- One hundred: The player tosses all six jacks into the air. Then, flipping his or her hand over, he or she catches as many of the falling jacks as possible onto the back of his or her hand.
- The catch: The player then tosses any jacks caught on the back of his or her hand into the air and catches as many as possible in his or her palm. Good players execute this move very quickly, with almost no toss at all, simply snatching the jacks from the backs of their hands.
- Scoring: The player scores five points each for jacks caught in his or her palm, plus an extra five for catching his or her color.
