the.com/monkeybars

the original test of whether your grip can outlast your courage.

means A piece of playground equipment consisting of a horizontal overhead ladder you cross by swinging hand-to-hand from rung to rung.

from A 20th-century American playground name, stitching together "monkey" — for the limb-swinging, brachiating way kids cross them, like apes through branches — and "bars," the simple metal rungs. The same monkey-imagery gives us "monkeyshines" and "monkeying around," all leaning on the long-held image of monkeys as agile, mischievous climbers. The formal name is the "horizontal ladder" or "jungle gym," but the kids' word stuck, because anyone hanging there does feel briefly, gloriously simian.

true name
officially called overhead ladders or horizontal ladders
patented
invented in 1920 by a Chicago lawyer's son
named for
creator nicknamed his playground the jungle gym
physics gift
teaches kids momentum before they know the word
injury hotspot
a leading cause of playground arm fractures
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