A few years ago in Britain, we found POGS in our packets of crisps. Why were POGS so-called and how was the game of POGS played?

The game of pogs originated in the 1920s on the Hawaiian island of Maui. There dairy workers played the game during breaks using simple milkcaps. Almost 70 years later, a Hawaiian schoolteacher reintroduced the game and mass appeal soon followed.

Pogs, (an acronym for a popular Hawaiian drink made from Passion fruit, Oranges and Guava juices) is played with disc-like object which have pictures on its face side. Each player would take an equal number of pogs and would stack at least four pogs one on top of another with the faces down. One of the players would then take a different-sized disc (called a slammer) and would strike a stack of the pogs with it. Whichever pogs landed faceup would be retained by that player. After each player had taken their turn(s), the one with the most pogs was the winner.