
When I was a kid, playgrounds had dome shaped things called jungle gyms for kids to play on. At Winthrop and Ainslie, there were no playgrounds in February 1976 when I took this shot, so kids had to climb on something else. I found these kids trying to outdo each other on this old tree. The limb that the boy on the left is standing on fell after I snapped this shot. Fortunately, he wasn’t hurt. The kids in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood were tough. This was facing northwest from the intersection of Winthrop and Ainslie. A reader pointed out that the vacant lot is now a community garden. The building on the left is long gone, but the building on the right in the background still stands.