02x18 - School Dazed

[bunniefuu]

[light whimsical music]
[electrical buzzing]

- Do you know that
there was a time

when your school bus driver
was also your classmate?

- They set these
teenagers up for success

the best way they knew how,
with a three-day driving course.

- So they go from driving
this bus in the dark

to getting out and
taking a math test.

- Or when the school
board was made of wood?

- The paddles were branded with
our school's crest on there.

If they hit you with it, it
would, like, bruise the logo.

That's messed up!

- Or when gym class was
more like basic training?

- Nobody's wearing a harness.

If you lose your grip,

it's like falling out of
a second-story window.

Even if you're in
a burning building,

firefighters will
tell you not to jump

from a second or third story

unless you have
absolutely no choice.

And we're telling kids
to do this in gym class.

- These are the things
we used to do.

For fun,

for money,

or maybe out of boredom

that we'll never see again.

Were they dangerous?

Certainly.

Deadly?

Occasionally.

But boy, wasn't it exciting?

[intense dramatic music]

[light whimsical music]

Remember high
school science lab?

Powerful gases, open flame,
chemical reactions, sharp tools,

all in the name of education,

until we learned it was
not so smart after all.

[bright thoughtful music]

- After World w*r
II, science is king.

After all, it won the w*r.

The atomic b*mb,
radar, computers.

- There is a great emphasis
in the United States

on developing
scientific knowledge

among younger and
younger people.

And so, the
government authorizes

the construction of science labs

in schools across the country.

- [Henry] These labs are
built to turn teenagers

into the next
generation of scientists

by throwing them
right into the fire.

- [Martin] Suddenly, you're
sitting at a desk that's got

burners, and there's masks, and
there's equipment, and there's

gear, and there's
strange smells,

and you have
knife-like instruments,

and you're going
to dissect things.

Oh, man, it was amazing.

- The craziest thing
about science lab

is the chemicals
they let you use.

There's sulfuric acid, which
will burn the crap out of you.

There was formaldehyde,
chloroform,

which bad guys use in
movies all the time

to knock people out
and abduct them.

There's just jars of
it in science lab.

- [Henry] But there's
no bigger draw

in the high school science
labs of old than mercury.

- [News Reporter] The
great density of mercury,

atomic weight 200.61,

is known when heavy
objects are dropped into it

or, better, onto it.

They float almost magically.

- Mercury is a metallic element

that remains liquid
at room temperature.

That's really rare for a metal.

Do you remember the T-1000
from "Terminator 2?"

It's exactly like that.

But in your science lab.

- [Hakeem] Mercury is cool
for many reasons.

Number one, it's the only
liquid that's not wet.

The second thing is,
it looks really cool,

and it beads up and makes
these nice little ba*ls, right?

You combine them
and separate them.

- I don't remember
any reason I had

mercury in the palm of my hand,

except to look at it, move
around, like, it's fun.

- [Hakeem] The teachers at this
time

encourage the kids
to play with mercury.

There's jars of it.

They can roll it around,
throw it at your friend.

It is mayhem in those classes.

- [Henry] But all these
budding young scientists

are playing with poison.

- If there was a toxic
chemical hall of fame,

mercury's gonna be in
the inaugural class.

- [Don] Experts think
it's only intense,

prolonged exposure to mercury
that causes health issues.

Like the tremors and
hallucinations suffered

by hat makers using mercury
in the 19th century.

That was the inspiration
for the Mad Hatter

from "Alice in Wonderland".

- [Martin] Exposure to mercury
can cause headaches, paranoia,

neurological decline.

It's very, very bad for you.

- [Austin] But people at the
time

think that low-level
exposure is fine.

Also, no reason to argue 'cause
high school chemistry labs

are doing a bang-up job.

Between the 1950s and the


and engineers in the United
States nearly triples.

- [Hakeem] But in the 1980s, we
became concerned about

high mercury levels
in fish like tuna,

but kids have already been
exposed to it for decades.

It ain't the sushi,
it's the school lab.

- By the mid-'80s,

evidence of the dangers
of mercury exposure

start to pile up, but it takes
some significant accidents

to get the attention
of the government.

- [Dan] In a Connecticut high
school lab in 1986,

mercury vapors are
accidentally released

during an experiment.


get briefly exposed.

- The researchers
were shocked to learn

how long this toxic metal
remained in people's systems.

We're talking months
or even years.

- [Dan] The mercury residue
stays on tables.

It collects in the floor cracks
where it might have spilled

and then eventually just
vaporizes into the air.

Plus, students are
tracking it on their shoes.

Maybe they don't get all
of it off their fingers

when they're playing with it,

and then at lunchtime, they
end up swallowing some of it.

- If you think about
all of these experiments

using mercury over decades,

they're accumulating a
lot of mercury in schools.

- Eventually, though,
things change.

Some states step in

and outlaw the use of
mercury in schools.

- [Austin] Today, mercury in
school labs

has been almost
completely phased out.

- [Don] In the last few decades,
any kind of mercury exposure

that happens in school it's
a total holy crap moment.

Some kids bust open
an old thermometer

and hazmat suits come out.

- In 2004, a kid in Nevada found
his grandfather's mercury,

brought it into school, and
shared it with his friends.

They played with it,
not knowing the hazards.

- [Don] More than 60 kids have
to be decontaminated.

Their clothes disposed
of as hazardous waste,

just because they
were briefly exposed

to something we used
to play with as kids.

- Remember the
school paper cutter

that was more like a guillotine?

That was nothing compared to
what they gave us in wood shop.

[light whimsical music]

- [Hakeem] Back in the day, a
lot of high schools

and even middle
schools had wood shops.

And they really
got big in the '50s

when America was having
this construction boom.

- I mean, they're the real deal.

They've got real machinery.

There's real wood.

There's sawdust everywhere.

- [Brian] We would make clocks.

We would make key chain holders.

Like, Christmas was covered.

'Cause all you had
to do was bring in,

like, a little block of
wood, and this crusty old guy

would teach you how to cut
it and leave you to it.

He would be like, "Go ahead
and have fun cutting wood,

and then you go out
and smoke a cigarette."

- [Rutledge] I loved wood shop.

We would build these sheds

that the high school would
sell to the community.

So sometimes when I
drive around the town,

I can see sheds in
people's backyards,

and I know I helped build
all these years later.

- [Hakeem] For some kids,
it's just fun, right?

They can go in there and
build a birdhouse or whatever.

But for others, they want to
go directly from high school

to a trade school and
then have a career at it.

So this is early job training.

- [Henry] Of all the tools
in the school wood shop,

one looms larger than the
rest: the radial arm saw.

- So the radial arm saw
is invented in the 1920s

by a guy named Raymond
DeWalt of DeWalt Tools.

That same guy.

[saw whirring]

- [Hakeem] The radial arm saw
can cut through two-inch lumber

like a hot knife
going through butter.

And by the 1950s,
they're everywhere,

including thousands of high
schools across the country.

- [Henry] But it turns out

it just might be too much
saw for kids to handle.

- The radial arm
saw was no joke.

It was on an arm,

and you sort of pulled it
towards you and worked the wood.

- [Hakeem] Sometimes it kind
of lurches forward.

So because of the
way it's operated,

you're automatically
in harm's way.

- It'll slice your finger
off just like that,

and there's really no
time to react to it,

especially if you're a kid.

So you're not just
talking about,

like, cuts and bruises here.

You're talking about amputation.

- [Brian] When you have


wood shop with dangerous tools,
it's not a question of if.

It's a question of when
some kid's gonna get hurt.

- My number one goal in wood
shop was don't lose a finger.

If I come out of this with
something higher than an F

and 10 digits, I'm gonna
consider it a success.

- [Don] These amateur wood shop
kids

are lucky to keep their
extremities intact,

but some of them
aren't so fortunate.

- And there are some
horrible stories.

There's this one


who actually cuts off his
entire hand at the wrist.

- [Rutledge] The kid survives,
but these kinds of stories

give the radial arm saw
a really bad reputation.

- [Ricky] It's pretty wild
when you think about it

that we would
actually go to school

and they would put us in
situations where losing a finger

or even an appendage
is on the table.

- [Henry] Between
injuries, rising insurance,

and more focus on
different school subjects,

eventually the funding for
wood shops gets cut off.

[saw whirring]

- [Rutledge] By the late 2000s,

only 30% of schools
still have a wood shop.

I mean, that's such a bummer.

- [Brian] I'm 50.

When I was 12, I made a key
chain holder that, to this day,

hangs on the family wall.

And I still look at it today!

[saw whirring]

- [Rutledge] There's something
to be said for shop class.

I mean, the things
that it teaches you,

whether it's trying
to understand

how something goes into a wall

or measure twice, cut once,
all of those things you learn,

they're actually
great life lessons

that really help you a lot.

Also, keep your
arm out of the saw.

You know?

Invaluable lesson.

- In the 1990s and 2000s,

many schools cut
their shop programs,

and those wood shops were
converted to technology labs.

Suddenly, the most
dangerous thing in the room

was the internet.

- It's an old cliche.

You know, in my day,

I had to walk 10 miles
to school in the snow.

And kids just rolled their eyes.

But was it actually true?

- In the late 1800s,
school in the United States

is a very local affair,
and it's kind of slapdash.

Lots of kids are working
on farms or factories,

and the law permits
them to do it.

- By the turn of
the century, though,

progressive reformers in cities,

but also out in the countryside,

are saying, "We need to make
school accessible to everyone.

We also need to
make it compulsory.

We wanna remove these
kids from these harsh jobs

and get them into
educational opportunities.

That will maybe give them other
options later in life."

- [Natalia] In every single
state,

you have laws that
are put on the books

that say your kids
have to go to school,

usually until
about age 14 or so.

- [Henry] Now, millions more
kids are marching to school,

but there's a catch.

- In urban areas,
there's lots of schools.

A lot of times close enough
for kids to go home for lunch.

- But at this point of
the turn of the century,

more than half of the United
States lives in rural areas.

- [Lance] For rural kids, that
means a walk to school.

A long walk.

- [Rutledge] Kids as young
as five years old

are walking three to five miles

over all sorts of rough terrain

and busted-up roads
every single day.

Five years old!

By themselves.

- [Adam] There are even stories
of students who have no choice

but to walk 10 miles each way.

For perspective, that's just
six miles shy of a marathon

every school day.

And you thought it was bad

when you couldn't get a
seat on the school bus.

- [Lance] It's especially tough
in cold, inclement weather,

but these kids do what it takes.

They carry their books in
flour sacks to protect them.

They carry their
lunches in pails

that are frozen shut by
the time they arrive.

They will actually
use the fence posts

as a guide in
whiteout conditions.

- And springtime's
not always easier.

I mean, some kids are having
to walk holding their shoes

so they don't lose
their shoes in the mud

'cause they're walking
in mud for miles.

- [Adam] There are people of a
generation that will say,

"I walked seven miles to
school uphill both ways."

The truth of the matter is
they were walking like that,

and they were made of much
tougher stuff than most of us.

- [Natalia] Teachers have left
records where they comment

on students.

"He walks an hour and
a half to get here."

"He was soaking wet
when he arrived."

It's pretty incredible to
think kids ever did this.

- [Lance] In January of 1888,

there's a huge blizzard
in the Dakotas.

It comes to be known as
the Children's Blizzard

or the Schoolhouse Blizzard
because so many children die

trying to get home from
school in this blizzard.

At least 100 die.

- [Henry] In the 1930s,
the millions of kids

marching long
distances to school

finally start to catch a break.

[light thoughtful music]

- [Rutledge] The Great
Depression actually helped the

kids with the
president's New Deal.

So suddenly there were new
schools, new paved roads,

and buses to help get
the kids to school.

- [Adam] When Henry Ford
enters the picture,

state-of-the-art buses

start rolling off of
the assembly line,

not only providing
transportation to school

for so many children, but also
giving parents peace of mind

that they're going
in a safe vehicle.

- [Edward] And from there,
school buses take off

because Ford is
cranking them out,

and pretty soon they become

a ubiquitous part of
the American landscape.

- [Rutledge] It's funny when I
think about

school buses when I was a kid,

and I thought they were kind
of gross and the vinyl seat,

and they'd have tears
and graffiti on them.

But for these kids,

I mean, this could be a
life-or-death situation.

When they got a school bus,
they were like, "Oh, my gosh!

I've arrived alive at school

with a non-frozen
lunch, perhaps.

What a novel idea."

- Parents had to
feel much better

about putting their
kids on a school bus

until perhaps they took a
look at who was driving it.

- [Edward] When America plunges
into World w*r II,

suddenly millions of American
men are put in uniform

and sent abroad, meaning
there's a big labor shortage.

- [Brian] The men are overseas
fighting.

The women are in the factories.

You got Rosie the Riveter.

They're making the
tanks, the bombs,

they're doing everything, right?

Who's driving the school buses?

Well, we have an answer.

Teenagers.

Yeah, they got teenagers
to drive the school buses.

- [Austin] Most people
don't blink an eye.

They're doing their
part for the w*r effort.

- [Brian] And these kids
aren't necessarily

the worst choice for this job.

They're picking up a
lot of slack at home.

They're driving tractors,
they're working farms,

they're working with
heavy machinery,

but they are still teenagers.

- [Edward] And these school
buses are not tractors.

They're 27 feet long,

and they're also loaded
with up to 36 kids.

- [Brian] But they set these
teenagers up for success

the best way they knew how,
with a three-day driving course.

Today, you need,
like, seven weeks

and a massive test
to get that license.

Back then, it was like, [clicks
tongue] "You're good enough.

Get out there."

- [Rutledge] A typical morning
for a teen bus driver:

you get to park the bus at home,

so you wake up crack of
dawn, go fire up the bus.

You drive all these rural routes

picking up kids in the dark.

Sounds great!

- Once they reach school,
they just park the bus,

get off with the rest of their
classmates, and go to class.

- So they go from driving
this bus in the dark

and wrestling no power steering

to getting out and
taking a math test.

- [Henry] And it turns out
teens driving school buses

isn't just a temporary solution.

- [Hakeem] During the w*r,
it goes so well

that for several decades
after the w*r, they continue.

In fact, when I was a
young man in high school,

we had kid bus drivers.

- [Rutledge] Schools were
excited 'cause they could pay

kids less than they were paying
adults, but they do, I think,

quickly realize you
get what you pay for.

- [Brian] There was a breakdown
in quality control

in teenage bus drivers
around the '80s.

It's the MTV generation.

It's the kids who
watched "Animal House."

There's no sense
of patriotic duty.

It's more about
getting a paycheck

and getting it over
as fast as you can,

and that's what they did.

- [Edward] Eventually, it's
impossible to ignore the data

regarding these teenage drivers.

They account for far less
than half the drivers,

but more than 60%
of the accidents.

- [Brian] So by the 1980s, one
by one, the states start making

it so teenagers can't
drive the school buses.

I don't know what it tells
you about North Carolina,

but they were the last
state to withdraw this.

- [Hakeem] But if you're a
parent today,

you can have the peace
of mind of knowing

that almost all school
districts in the country

require their drivers to be
at least 21 years of age.

- [Rutledge] It's really hard to
imagine a 14-year-old kid

getting behind the wheel
of an 18,000-pound bus

with only a couple days
of driving experience.

Oh, and, by the way, it's
loaded with children.

Like, that is bonkers on paper.

- There was a certain poetic
justice to kids driving kids.

Let them deal with
those little monsters.

- If you're of a certain age

and you were ever sent to
the principal's office,

you remember feeling
the pure terror.

You weren't just
gonna get yelled at.

You were in for some, let's
face it, physical discomfort.

- [Lance] Corporal punishment
goes way back.

Honestly, it probably
predates civilization,

but there are stories
of kids in school

getting some version of corporal
punishment, being beaten

in Greek texts from 500 BC.

- [Natalia] Fast-forward to the


and this is still
happening in schools.

There's the kind of, like,

burst of frustration
of a teacher, like,

hitting you upside the
head with a math book.

- [Lance] I came from a time
when corporal punishment

was perfectly allowed
in most schools.

You might be led down the
hall, pulled by the ear.

I don't know how I still
have ears, you know?

It's not that hard to
pull somebody's ear off.

- [Adam] I remember two friends
of mine telling me

that they used to have to
hold their hands like this

and were whacked with a ruler.

- There were even things
they would have people do,

like kneel in gravelly material.

Like frozen peas
or rice, you know?

Which doesn't sound that bad,
but try it for 10 minutes.

[light whimsical music]

- [Rutledge] My elementary
school principal was so mean.

And the amount of times that
she walked me into her office

and told me to take a
good look at the paddles.

"Paddles" being plural;
there was more than one.

They were branded with our
school's crest on there.

So that maybe if
they hit you with it,

it would, like, bruise the logo?

Like, that's messed up!

That wasn't that long ago.

- [Henry] For most
of the 20th century,

corporal punishment at school

isn't some hush-hush
off-the-books practice.

In fact, it's
quite the opposite.

- [Adam] Some school districts
have actually codified

corporal punishment,
literally writing regulations

up to and including
how many times

you can strike a student's
bottom for punishment.

- Schools have specific rooms
where this is carried out.

Prisons didn't even have that.

- [Natalia] In fact, when prison
corporal punishment

is banned in the 1960s,

school corporal punishment is
still legal in all 50 states.

- [Adam] Some companies
even manufacture

purpose-built paddles
for spanking students.

- [Rutledge] They even started
boring holes out

so they could get a better
velocity when they hit it

because there was more air going
through, so it went faster.

- [Natalia] In the 1970s in
Florida, there's one 14-year-old

who is beaten so badly
that he's hospitalized,

and his legal case goes all
the way to the Supreme Court.

His attorneys argue
that this is cruel

and unusual punishment.

- What the court says
might surprise you?

They say not only
is this not cruel,

it is anything but unusual.

And they claim that a
student has no expectation

of due process in school.

There's no more
official approval

for beating children in school

than the approval of the
United States Supreme Court.

- [Jason] But this decision,
it really spurs a movement

against corporal punishment.

- [Lance] Child psychologists
and educational experts

start to argue that corporal
punishment impairs development

and it normalizes violence.

- And by the mid-1980s,

a number of states have
actually now outlawed it.

- [Adam] These days, you get
remotely physical with any kid,

you find yourself in a
whole lot of trouble.

- [Rutledge] It is weird to
think that this is an era

that I lived through.

For kids that went through this,

like, people know, they
don't ever forget that stuff.

- Back in the schools of old,
rewards were hard to come by,

but there was one that most
of us probably remember.

Turns out it was less of a perk

and more occupational hazard.

[light thoughtful music]
[chalk tapping]

- The classic chalkboard
is a dying feature

of the American school system.

It was the look and
the sound of learning.

It's like what we
associated with school.

- [Martin] Every surface in the
classroom

has chalk dust on
it to some extent.

You also have erasers,

and the erasers are
bathed in chalk dust.

- [Hakeem] Erasers are cleaned
by just going outdoors

and slapping them together

and making big
clouds of chalk dust.

It's kind of like beating
the dirt out of a rug.

- [Don] And teachers hand out
this job

only to the most trustworthy,

well-behaving students like me.

- [Martin] I frequently was
awarded with this myself.

And so I had the experience
of being able to go out there

and sort of strut past
everyone like, "Look at me.

I get to go clap the erasers."

- [Ricky] I love clapping
erasers together.

It's like a primal urge that
we don't entirely understand.

If there were two erasers handy,

I'd clap them
together right now.

- [Don] For kids trapped in
school for most of the day,

any chance to go outside,

especially with the rest
of the school inside.

This is huge.

So you feel special, you feel
privileged, you feel trusted,

and you can make fun of
all those poor b*stards

still stuck in class.

- [Henry] The kids get a perk.

Teachers get free labor
for clean erasers.

Everyone is happy, until we
start taking a closer look.

- It seems crazy to say this,

but for a tool that
was used for centuries

around children worldwide,

we now know that chalk
ain't good for you.

- [Martin] Old chalk is actually
dustier than modern chalk is.

And the clouds of dust
that are produced by it

contain one of the greatest

carcinogens of
them all: asbestos.

And it's the best and
brightest student in the class

who is probably getting
the greatest exposure.

- [Don] By the 1990s, research
indicates that chalk inhalation

can cause long-term lung damage.

We also find that chalk
dust is a common trigger

for asthma and allergies.

- [Negin] I mean, and who knows
how many eraser clappers

are asthmatic children
breathing in this chalk dust?

Because they're being
rewarded for being so good.

- [Don] We all know what a big
deal

childhood asthma is at the time.

It's being called an epidemic.

It's rising by 75%
between 1980 and 1994.

Asthma is one of the biggest
reasons kids miss school.

- [Henry] But while the children

start getting all the attention,

who's thinking
about the teachers?

- [Hakeem] The teachers are
spending day after day,

week after week, year after year

writing on these chalkboards
and breathing chalk dust.

And nobody thought to ask,
"Is this good for you?"

- [Martin] It's the teachers
unions

that eventually
push back on this.

They begin to advocate for
chalk that produces less dust,

chalk that doesn't
contain carcinogens.

And then eventually

they advocate for the
elimination of the chalkboard

as a part of the educational
experience entirely.

- Which is why the days
of clapping those erasers

is essentially over.

- [Ricky] I think kids are
missing out

on a lot of the
experiences that we had.

I mean, eraser clapping
was something that kids

would practically fight each
other for the right to do.

I mean, anything to go outside.

So I do feel a little
sorry for kids today.

- If I knew then

what I know now about the
dangers of chalk dust,

I would still jump at the chance

to skip 10 minutes of class.

- Ah, gym class.

The one period a day where
sweating counted as schoolwork.

Some of us look
back on it fondly.

Others remember it as "Lord
of the Flies" in gym shorts.

[light whimsical music]

- [Lance] For most of the 1900s,
what we're doing in gym class,

the fact that we're
even having gym class,

is really driven
by the military.

- [Martin] During the era of the
World Wars and Korea,

the US recognizes
that it's requisite.

We have to do something to
promote physical fitness,

and we make generations of
young Americans experience

either the bliss or the shame

of the experience of physical
education in high school.

- [News Reporter] A set of
physical achievement standards

has been prepared by the
Armed Forces Committee

of the American Association
for Health, Physical Education,

and Recreation.

- [Lance] The particular
freak out in the 1950s

leads to the infamous

Presidential Physical
Fitness Test.

Many of us remember that
mile run, pull-ups, sit-ups.

It wasn't really so
much a physical test

as an exercise in humiliation.

- [Henry] Among these
military-inspired gym exercises,

there's one challenge dreaded
by generations of kids.

The infamous rope climb.

- [Jason] The rope climb, this
is something that, you know,

soldiers do in basic training.

So it's the natural fit

for the quasi-militaristic
gym culture.

- [Martin] For the small
investment of a section of 30

feet of rope.

and a shackling system on
the ceiling of the gym,

you have an excellent
means of evaluating

the physical fitness of
the students in the class.

- [Jason] You're supposed to
climb all the way up to the top,

touch the ceiling,
and make it down,

and you are being timed.

Sure, right.

Like we're all Olympic gymnasts.

- [Brian] And it's a weird thing
when you're climbing a rope

as a child in gym class
because you have an audience.

To fail at climbing the rope
in front of the entire class,

it's a humiliation ritual.

You feel like your entire worth

is invested in how high
you can get up that rope.

These are high, high stakes,

and we all went through it,
and not all of us did well.

- [Henry] For lots of kids,

the rope climb is
like a bad dream.

But the dangers of this test
go far beyond embarrassment.

- The rope climb
is really insane.

I mean, we're asking kids to
do things that soldiers do.

And if you get to
the top of the rope,

you're talking climbing


- Nobody's wearing a helmet.

Nobody's wearing a harness.

There's no safety
equipment or anything.

The gym teachers probably
haven't been taught anything.

- [Lance] They would put
a little mat down,

but it was a really thin mat.

It's clear that that was
not there to protect you.

It was there to
protect the floor.

- [Edward] And they're just
saying, "Who can do it?"

You know, scale 20, 30 feet,

and then hopefully you can
let yourself down slowly,

but if you lose your grip,

it's like falling out of
a second-story window.

- [Lance] Even if you're in
a burning building,

firefighters will
tell you not to jump

from a second or third story

unless you have
absolutely no choice.

And we're telling kids
to do this in gym class.

- [Martin] The week that we
struggled through the rope

course, we were all just
burned up by the rope,

and that's just the
way life was back then.

- [Jason] By the early 2000s,

you start to hear more
and more complaints

about rope climbing injuries.

Kids are falling, they're
hurting themselves,

they're getting rope burned.

- [Martin] In one case, this
girl hits the floor so hard

that it requires pins to
get her back together again.

That is too much.

You have asked too much
of children at that stage.

- [Jason] This is a
generation of parents

who also had to go
through this humiliation.

So they're like, "You know what?

I had to go through this,
and this was terrible.

This stops now."

- [Martin] In 2013, a journal
for physical education

admits the rope climb

into the Physical
Fitness Hall of Shame,

and I can see why.

- [Brian] Oh, by the time I even
got to the fire academy,

they were like, "Yeah, we
don't do a rope climb anymore

'cause too many people get hurt.

It's dangerous."

- [Jason] Today, the rope climb,
it's pretty much disappeared.

Or where it still exists,

it's much shorter and
with plenty of padding.

We went through it.

Kids today thankfully don't.

But you know what?

Yeah, you kids, you don't
know how lucky you've got it.

- Dangling 20 feet up in
gym class was bad enough.

But do you remember
the free-for-all

that was called recess?

With hundreds of kids and only
a handful of adults watching,

the playground was more
like a battleground.

[bright upbeat music]

- [Austin] Recess is designed
for children to get out there,

get some fresh air, run
off some energy

and, you know, just
generally enjoy themselves

and socialize.

- [Rutledge] In places like my
school,

it was essentially a
time for young boys

to just figure out how
to as*ault one another

under the guise
of playing a game.

- [Brian] I went to PS 53,
which behind the school

had a giant dirt lot next
to a giant asphalt lot.

And that was recess.

It was violent, sometimes
bloody, but always fun.

- [Austin] Games in the 1980s
had names like Suicide,

Butts Up,

k*ll the Carrier.

- [J Mack] One of our favorite
games was k*ll the Quarterback.

One guy had the ball and
basically just tried to survive

while all the other
kids just tackled him.

- [Rutledge] We would play a
pretty aggressive form of tag

where it looked like you
were tackling a person,

and then you would
say, "I got you."

- [Brian] Oh, I loved dodgeball.

The method that we
did on Staten Island

was it was a ring of
people around you.

There was just like seven
of you in the middle.

It was like a
circular firing squad.

It was like a public stoning.

Brutal!

- [Henry] But one recess classic

manages to combine a nursery
rhyme, peer pressure,

and a full-speed collision.

- Red Rover is two
lines of people

that are holding hands together,

essentially making
like a human chain.

And then you pick one person
out of the other group,

and you say, "Red Rover, Red
Rover, send John on over."

- It's a rhyme.

It sounds like something
fun that kids say.

- [Rutledge] And then John has
to drop hands with his team

and try to smash
through the human chain.

- Red Rover goes back centuries.

One theory says it's based
on a taunt by English kids

against Viking invaders
who were called Rovers.

So it's literal
medieval warfare.

- [Brian] I mean, if you gotta
get through the Red Rover line,

you're gonna do
what you have to do

to get through the
Red Rover line.

Great shame upon
you and your family

if you let the
Red Rover through.

- [Rutledge] You're either
clotheslining someone

or someone is trying
to break your wrist.

Like those are kind
of the only options

that exist in this game.

- [J Mack] So many potential
injuries are at risk there.

You could fracture your
shoulder, elbow, wrist,

fingers, deep bruises.

You're just asking
for injury here.

That's recess.

Yay! [chuckles]

What a fun time.

- [Henry] Schools largely
ignore the Red Rover matches

that break out at recess.

Until the lawyers
start showing up.

- No one wants to face lawsuits

like one filed by two San
Diego parents in 2011.

That ended with a
$15,000 settlement

for their seventh grader
injured during Red Rover.

- [Brian] I think the
roughhousing at recess,

it taught me that there
are worse things in life

than taking hits, you know?

I think there are
valuable lessons

in getting hit and
standing back up.

- There's been some
internet chatter

that Red Rover is banned
from some US schools.

Not officially, but sadly,
the chain has been broken.

- In the old days,

schools believed students
didn't learn anything

unless they really
got their hands dirty.

Or in some cases, bloody.

[bright lively music]

- [Natalia] Before World w*r II,
the science of blood

was really a kind
of unknown terrain.

When blood transfusion
becomes necessary,

a lot of people die

because of cross-pollination
of different blood types.

- [Lance] By the 1950s, we've
generally figured out

that if you want to give
someone a blood transfusion,

it's going to fail unless
you match blood types.

So high school biology
teachers figure out

the science is
really pretty simple.

Hey, here is a
learning opportunity,

and thus begins
the painful ritual

of figuring out
your own blood type.

- [Henry] Schools
embrace the idea.

It's useful.

It's educational.

And after all, what harm
could come from a little poke?

- [Dan] High school
students from the '50s

all the way through the '90s

probably remember
this really well.

One day you get to take a
break from all the boring stuff

you're doing in science class
and go test your own blood.

- [Don] Teachers hand out

these little sharp
lancets, they're called,

these little prickers.

So students can then
poke each other's fingers

to draw blood.

- [Dan] The students take
their bleeding finger

with that drop of blood on
it, and they touch a slide,

and their blood
mixes with a serum

to figure out which
blood type they have.

- I was staring at
this little object

that has a point on it.

And I'm like, "I'm supposed
to puncture my own skin?"

And it's like a serious point.

That's the thing.

I can remember how it was
like a little tiny knife.

I think I might have a scar

on one of these
fingers from that.

- [Dan] There's no informed
consent here.

Parents are not
asked beforehand.

To be fair, it is just a drop,

but by today's standards,
this would not fly.

- [Henry] It can be a bit of a
bloodbath in the biology lab,

but that's hardly
the only issue.

- [Dan] People just
aren't very cautious

about blood-borne pathogens,
things like hepatitis.

So these lancets are
getting passed around

pretty much willy-nilly,
shared by students,

not sterilized, just reused.

- [Don] And to make matters
worse,

a lot of these test results
are just plain useless.

They're wrong.

- [Dan] Today, most schools
forbid teachers

from using real student blood
in any kind of experiment.

- [Natalia] In 2013, there's an
example of a teacher

doing one of these
blood typing activities.

Word gets to the
principal's office,

and the principal
reportedly runs in,

and it's like, "Stop
the lab! Stop the lab!"

and basically fires the
teacher on the spot.

- High school kids
have been sneaking in

beer and pot forever,

but there was a time

when you didn't have to smuggle
in contraband to get a buzz

because there were
plenty of school supplies

that would do the job for you.

- [Brian] It is an interesting
fact

that for most of
the 20th century,

kids at school had access
to all sorts of things

that can get them high.

- [Jason] There's that old
standby glue,

and I'm not talking
about white Elmer's glue.

I'm talking about its stronger
cousin from art class,

rubber cement.

- [Kavitha] Magic markers come
along in the 1950s,

and they're a game
changer, and kids love them

because they have these

brilliant colors
that don't fade.

- [Dan] You take out your
marker, you pull off the cap,

you take a whiff, then
you start drawing.

And it's just how you did it.

Even though after a while,

you started to feel
a little loopy.

- [Henry] With the
all-time classic item

that could send you on a trip,

a freshly printed document
from the ditto machine.

- For those in Gen X and older,

you could probably remember
a secretary in the office

cranking this machine,
and they call it a ditto.

- [Brian] I remember them well.

That transfer ink
could get you high.

The first thing you
did was you smelled it.

The first thing, 'cause
it smelled delightful.

- [Hakeem] When you got those
new papers,

the first thing we did
as kids is we [sniffing]

[sighs] gave it a smell
and got a little buzz.

- [Brian] I remember Mrs. Shea
handing out those papers

and just sniffing it.

[sniffs] Smell is
like childhood.

It was beautiful.

Also was poisoning our
tiny little brains.

- [Henry] What's causing
kids to feel euphoric

over freshly printed paper?

It's the ink!

Which is loaded with methanol.

[light inquisitive music]

- Methanol is like ethanol,
which is the alcohol we drink.

Only this is way worse.

- [Dan] Once it's in your
system, it turns into

formaldehyde.

Small doses can give you a
headache or nausea or dizziness,

but repeated exposures to
methanol can cause blindness,

seizures, and even death.

- [Kavitha] Schools seem
blissfully unaware

that every time they
hand out a test,

they're handing out a
paper full of toxins.

- [Dan] And eventually, this
machine

just kind of disappears
in the 20th century.

- [Brian] The reign of the
machine didn't end

because suddenly
teachers were like,

"I think we're
poisoning these kids."

Like it ended because
an easier method

for the teachers to make
copies was invented.

That's it.

If it wasn't for that,
they'd still be like,

"Go ahead, kid,
sniff, sniff away."

- Who knew that the gateway
drug for an entire generation

would turn out to be
a purple worksheet.

- As the legendary Motley
Crue sang in the 1980s,

everybody knows that smoking
ain't allowed in school.

But looking back,

those guys really didn't
do their homework.

- [Natalia] Smoking is so
forbidden

and kind of legally
regulated today

that it is hard to imagine

how much of a national
phenomenon it was.

- [Austin] At smoking's
peak in the 1960s,

around 40% of American
adults were lighting up.

And a Philip Morris
study finds that in 1968,

almost 20% of 15-
to 18-year-olds

are current regular smokers.

- [Henry] But in the old days,
there's one part of society

really holding the
line on youth smoking.

- [Negin] Up to the 1960s,
school had a lot of rules about

smoking because it
was a fire hazard.

Interestingly, it had
like nothing to do

with it being a health hazard.

It was mostly like, "Don't
cause a fire at school."

- [Edward] Over time, especially
as we get into the 1960s,

teenagers continue to
look for ways to smoke.

They smoke in the bathroom,
they smoke in the gym,

they smoke behind the
school, behind the dumpster.

- [Negin] It's just rampant
throughout schools,

and school
administrators are like,

"We have to do
something about this."

- [Henry] With teenagers
smoking anywhere

and everywhere at school,

administrators finally decide
to draw that line in the sand.

- Schools do the only thing
that they can do to combat this,

and they say, "Go
smoke outside."

- [Edward] Administrators come
to the conclusion

that they can't stop
kids from smoking.

It's just a fruitless task.

So what they decide
to do is to say,

"Well, let's manage it."

Let's say to your students,
"You all can smoke over there

in a designated spot."

- [Austin] My high school had
a smoking section,

which was in a parking lot
behind one of our cafeterias,

and kids were
allowed to go outside

and have a cigarette
during lunch periods.

- [Brian] You can smoke all you
want.

Just do it outside.

Just saying that is so wild.

- [Austin] This is the craziest
if you can't beat them,

join them move in
education history.

- [Henry] And students aren't
the only ones lighting up.

- [Negin] Sometimes the teachers

are bumming a smoke
off the students.

You know, it's just like one

big cross-generational
cigarette fest.

- I wonder how many
teachers gave good grades

to students who hooked
them up with cigarettes.

I bet you more than a few
students got bumped up

to like a B+ or something
like that from a B

just for having some
extra cigarettes on them.

- [Negin] The teens have
these really fun names

for their little smoking places.

They have like The
Wall or The Pit,

or literally Cancer
Corner was a nickname.

So they knew.

Everybody knew
what was going on.

- [Edward] This lasted well
into the 1980s,

by which time everybody
knows the dangers of smoking.

- [Henry] The high
school smoking section

drags on for decades until it
too is eventually stubbed out.

- Federal and state governments

ban smoking in public places.

And they also threaten
to pull funding

from places that expose
kids to cigarette smoke.

- [Austin] And then there's the
dangers of secondhand smoke.

It's one thing to allow the kids

who want to smoke
their privileges,

but the second they
start affecting others,

that's gonna cause
some lawsuits.

- [Edward] So these days, the
vast majority of schools

are no-smoking schools, not
just in the school itself,

but on all the property,
including no vaping.

- [Brian] Look at back in the
day, it was always the cool,

sexy guys with a cigarette in
the side of the thing.

Hanging out, probably
on a classic car,

while some like, you
know, wimpy little dude

with healthy lungs is
getting picked up by his mom.

I was never that
person. [laughs]

I was the one getting
picked up by my mom.

- Remembering the
school days we survived,

whether we were getting
paddled, sniffing markers,

or stabbing our classmates
in the name of science.

Schools once taught
us reading, writing,

and a whole lot of risk.

But somehow we had
more passes than fails.

And that's why our hazardous
history really made the grade.

[intense dramatic music]