PAA. Short for Playground Appreciation Association.

At its peak, a group of 20 or so members between the ages of 16 and 22 who would congregate at local playgrounds and schools to play tag.

The PAA was located in and around the Minneapolis, MN area of the United States. Members would travel for up to an hour and a half to visit a wide variety of playgrounds.

Players would execute amazing jumps and stunts, such as the Portman and Jason Waye, to tag their prey, evade capture, and impress one another with outstanding physical prowess.

Preliminary attempts were made to produce a video which would highlight the exciting and dangerous aspects of tag that were considered very fun by its participants. Although early copies of such a video exist, no superb collection of footage was ever released.

The PAA was active over a period of almost 4 years. The association was created when the founding members stumbled upon Lone Lake Elementary School some 50 miles out of Minneapolis. A period of time from 1997 to 1998 is known as the golden age of tag, where PAA members were enthusiastically pushing the envelope and changing common conceptions of tag as a game, a sport, and a lifestyle.

The last recorded PAA-sponsored game was sometime in late 2000. Injuries were light, with only a few skinned knees and one mildly twisted ankle.

One outstanding aspect of the PAA was the maturity of the group, notably their respect for law enforcement officers when they occasionally arrived on the scene.

More information can be found at http://mpls.k12.mn.us/~eswalker/paa, the PAA's homepage since 1997.

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