The European rapier isn’t my weapon, but to me these kids don’t look half bad. If they got this far just by watching Errol Flynn movies, I’m quite impressed. (Hell, if they were taking fencing lessons, I’m impressed by that, too.)

Figure 1. Aaron Siskind, ‘Boys playing with toy swords,’ Harlem, New York, ca. 1930-1940

Interestingly, inner-city New York fencing seems to be making a comeback.

(Courtesy of Making Light and the Library of Congress. From the exhibit When They Were Young: A Photographic Retrospective of Childhood.)