We did too... the older houses on the mainland which were two or more stories high, often had "sleeping porches" upstairs because it was cooler away from the hot ground. Typically it was a screen porch with the side facing the street with latticed or pierced wood for privacy- I go by an old Victorian-era house like that on Union Street every day.
When the Bug Truck drove by the house spraying DDT, all us kids went and played in the fog, reasoning with childish logic, "bad for bugs, good for me!"
Polio was still a terror then- I knew one kid in an iron lung, and everytime an outbreak was reported, all the Moms kept their kids out of the public swimming pools.
Never worried me much, because I disdained pools and swam only in the ocean.
RE: Polio
I remember when the whole small town lined up outside of the fire station to get our first polio vaccines. I remember my mother's disbelief that polio would be stopped. It was such an odd thing to see all of the families lined up in their family groups and chatting with the others about the miracle. I was probably 4 or 5; but it made a huge impression on me.