Well consulting with my daughters they are of the opinion that  
generally marbles are essentially male. But that jacks can be both.  
although primarily female (but that no one plays either much  
anymore). This matches my own recollection of my childhood. Boys did  
play jacks but not that much. Girls did a lot. Marbles on the other  
hand and yo-yos were big for guys.

On Oct 31, 2005, at 16:56, Robert L. Schuyler wrote:

> Interesting discussion. Now for some trouble. Would you agree that  
> GENERALLY speaking:
>
>                 Marbles = little boys
>                 "Jacks" =  little girls
>
> We have found both recently and have had a number of field  
> discussions (older peoples' memories) on this question.
>
>                                                         R.L. Schuyler
>
> P.S. In the late 1940s and 1950s we had marbles and although I had  
> some I never played the game. I do not remember
> my friends "playing marbles" as an every day event. Also remember  
> flipping bottle caps but this was also not that common. What I do  
> remember doing was taking the cork liners out of all bottle caps -  
> why ??? probably a mental aberration. It just had to be done.