As with Pick-Up Sticks, this game of dexterity and skill required a steady hand and a great deal of luck as players took turns using a metal hook to extract an object from a pile of plastic objects (shaped like axes, rifles, saws, ladders, brooms, spanners, hockey sticks, crutches, gardening implements etc.) dropped at random, without disturbing any other items.
If they succeeded, they kept the item and tried again. If they moved any object other than the one they were attempting to extricate, their turn was over.
The winner was the person with the most items once none were left in the pile.
This traditional game – which has been traced back to the Native Americans who passed it on to English settlers back when the US was still known as “the 13 colonies” – was originally played using lengths of real straw.