Children’s Folklore Recent Titles in Greenwood Folklore Handbooks Myth: a handbook

Choo-Choo
The leader starts by marching and saying “Choo-choo.” He taps a person on the shoulder 
and they put their arms around the leader’s back and enter another room. The leader then 
kisses the person he picked. Another person is picked, and so on. A train is the end result. As 
Boys play ball in Innsbruck, Austria, in the summer of 
1992. Photograph by Geoffrey Gould.

---

Examples and Texts 77
each person is being picked, each member of the train kisses the person behind them. When 
only one person is left, they have the idea of the game. Except when it comes to his turn to be 
kissed, the last person receives a light slap on the face instead. Obviously, the joke is on him.
Marilyn, age 13, explained how to play this game during a birthday party for 
her 12-year-old friend in New York City in April 1979. Choo-Choo is well estab-
lished in American folk tradition. Brian Sutton-Smith identifies it as a popular 
pursuit in his 1959 essay “The Kissing Games of Adolescents in Ohio” (470–71); 
Mary and Herbert Knapp also describe it in 
One Potato, Two Potato
(218). Sutton-
Smith observes that it is customary for players of Choo-Choo, sometimes called 
Pony Express, to give the last child who joins the train a playful slap. He also 
notes this game’s similarity to Fox and Goose in Gomme’s 
Traditional Games of 
England, Scotland, and Ireland
(1: 139).
Truth or Dare
Jackie: Did you ever feel it? A boy’s, I mean.
Colleen: (blushes) Give me a dare.
Paula: Okay, then you see that man over there? (points) You have to go over to him 
and kiss him and then you come back here.
Colleen: (walks toward man and returns without completing her dare) I can’t do 
that. Okay, I’ll tell you guys that I didn’t ever touch it and I don’t want to. 
Not yet anyway.
Jackie, Colleen, and Paula, all 12 years old, played Truth or Dare in a New York 
City park in April 1979. Initially they stood in a circle, lit a cigarette, and passed 
the cigarette around so that each girl could inhale. Whoever took a drag from the 
cigarette while ashes fell to the ground had to answer a personal question truth-
fully or perform a dare.
Mary and Herbert Knapp include Truth or Dare in their discussion of children’s 
kissing games; a typical dare is “Kiss Esther on the ear” (217). It is, of course, harder 
to kiss a stranger than to kiss a classmate or acquaintance, so Colleen’s decision to 
tell the truth instead of completing her dare makes good sense. Few folklorists have 
studied this kind of game playing, which usually takes place in a secluded setting.