(CLAIR | Simi Valley, CA) — If you grew up in Simi Valley in the ’60s, ’70s, or early ’80s, you probably remember the warnings: Don’t walk through the field. Stay away from the older kids. Get a ride home on the last day of school. Those words all meant one thing — Scrub Day. Even if you never saw it yourself — you probably remember hearing about it. Scrub Day, for a long time, was one of those strange, half-secret things that everyone heard about but few people ever experienced.
It wasn’t fun. And it wasn’t harmless. Scrub Day was a long-running hazing ritual — a “rite of passage” that occurred in Simi Valley and neighboring communities. Chatsworth, Moorpark, and Thousand Oaks are all reported to have had versions of this.
The hazing events happened almost every year, around the time sixth graders were finishing elementary school and preparing to move up to junior high. The older kids, mostly seventh and eighth graders, would get out of school a day early. They’d use that free day to wait near the local elementary schools — in the fields, along wash trails, or behind cars near the playgrounds — waiting for the younger ones to come walking home.
By most accounts, the kids doing the “scrubbing” weren’t model students. Most were the ones teachers knew by name for all the wrong reasons — the kids who pushed limits, caused fights, or hung around when they shouldn’t. They brought lipstick, markers, shaving cream, and sometimes even Nair. When the sixth graders came through, they’d chase them, corner them, and “scrub” them — smearing lipstick on faces, drawing on arms, spraying shaving cream into hair. The victims had no choice but to take it or run.
Stories from across Simi tell the same thing: it happened near Crestview, Hollow Hills, Garden Grove, Katherine — and others. Parents heard about it and were encouraged to drive their kids home on the last day of school. Teachers knew, too, but it was hard to stop. The fields were open, the trails unmonitored, and the ritual was well known among teens.
To the kids on the receiving end, it was terrifying. To the ones doing it, it was a show of power. And to the adults aware of it, Scrub Day was a problem that didn’t yet have a name.
It Wasn’t Just Simi
Simi’s Scrub Day was part of something much larger. The same kind of hazing culture appeared all over Southern California.
We even came across a 1950s Garden Grove High School yearbook that mentions “Scrub Day.” In that case, the hazing targeted ninth graders — not elementary school kids — showing that the ritual reached older students, too.
In 1988, Los Angeles Times education reporter Elaine Woo wrote about the ritual at Walter Reed Junior High in North Hollywood. Seventh graders were called “scrubs,” fair game for older students who rubbed lipstick or candy into their hair. Woo wrote that for many kids, “scrubbing” marked their first day in junior high — and their first real taste of humiliation. It was so common, students treated it like part of the school year, even though teachers called it what it was: bullying.
That same year, in Carlsbad, The Blade-Tribune ran a story headlined “Hazing: It’s Not Legal.” The problem there was similar — incoming freshmen were being attacked by older kids with scissors, who cut their hair as “tradition.” Parents, led by PTA member Hope Wrisley, pushed back. “We just decided that it was illegal, it was dangerous, and we weren’t going to wait until someone got hurt,” she told the paper. Carlsbad’s superintendent, Robert Crawford, said, “People do get hurt, either in the act of hazing or by trying to get away.” The local police reminded students that hazing was a misdemeanor punishable by a $500 fine — and told schools to report every case.
Those stories — one from the city, one from the coast — paint a picture of the time. For decades, hazing rituals were passed off as “harmless pranks.” It took parents, teachers, and law enforcement working together to finally call them what they were.
Fading Away
By the 1990s, Scrub Day had mostly disappeared from Simi. The city was growing fast — the fields and dirt paths where it used to happen turned into housing tracts, parks, and shopping centers. Schools adopted zero-tolerance policies toward hazing and bullying. Parents got more involved. Students were taught to report, not hide.
But for those who grew up in that earlier era, the memories haven’t faded. Ask around, and you’ll hear the same stories: a kid chased down on Fitzgerald Ave., another hiding behind the portable classrooms near the old Lincoln school, another who stayed home entirely that day. Some remember their parents driving them the long way around, just in case. Many still remember the panic of running.
What It Meant
Looking back, Scrub Day wasn’t a “rite of passage.” It was a way for certain kids — often the ones struggling the most — to take out their frustration on someone smaller. It reflected a time when bullying wasn’t called by its name, and when the line between “fun” and “fear” was still blurry in the culture. Most students didn’t want it. Most parents hated it. But for a long time, it was accepted because it kept happening.
If you grew up in Simi Valley back then, chances are you knew about it — even if you were lucky enough to avoid it. For a city that’s grown into one of the safest, most family-centered communities in the region, it’s a strange and sobering piece of its past.
So, do you remember Scrub Day? Did this happen near your school?
