Southern Indiana Living - Jan / Feb 2021

A Walk in the Garden with Bob Hill
Having some connections to
the game, most Hoosiers
surely realize our beloved
basketball was invented in
one day by Dr. James A. Naismith,
who was born in a farmhouse near
Almonte, Ontario – yes, he was a Canadian
– on Nov. 6, 1861.
Yes. Basketball. Farm. Canadian.
Promise.
I know so because about 30 years
ago I wrote “The Amazing Basketball
Book,” a paperback, now out-of-date
history of the game available for only
$2.50 on Amazon (plus who-knowswhat
shipping) and on forgotten
bookshelves everywhere.
Naismith was orphaned at 9,
taken in by a tough-minded uncle,
worked farm fields and as a lumberjack,
dropped out of high school at
15 and eventually attended McGill
University in Montreal to become
a minister. He earned his doctorate
and then found himself, in 1890, at a
Young Men’s Christian Association
(YMCA) school in Springfield, Massachusetts.
The sports world already had
football, track and baseball. But believe
it or not there was this sports
hole in the calendar all winter just
waiting to be filled.
In the fall of 1891, Naismith’s
boss, Dr. Luther Halsey Gulick Jr.,
asked Naismith to come up with that
very sport those bored students could
try in gymnasium class scheduled for
two weeks away. On the fourteenth
day, Dec. 21, Naismith came up with
basketball.
Merry Christmas.
Seasonal serendipity ruled. Naismith
found a soccer ball and a janitor
found a pair of peach baskets and
nailed them to a running track 10 feet
above the gym floor. Imagine if that
running track had been 12 feet off the
floor. Or, if as originally intended,
square wooden boxes were to have
served as goals. Would wooden boxball
with 12-foot dunks have survived?
Thus, Naismith had the equipment,
but the game needed some
rules. So, he blasted out 13 of them in
about an hour – promise – and basketball
rolled out its first game with
a few changes to occur over the next
129 years.
Those original 13 rules were
printed in the school newspaper. Naismith
suggested the goal be 15 inches
across – it is now 18 inches. He explained,
“The object of the game is
8 • Jan/Feb 2021 • Southern Indiana Living
This is the History of Basketball. Promise.
to put the ball into your opponent’s
goal. This may be done by throwing
the ball from any part of the grounds,
with one or both hands.”
The “grounds” part assumed
this new game could be played outdoors,
which it was – and is. The first
men’s game was played at the YMCA
in Springfield in 1891 with women
joining in shortly afterward at nearby
Smith College in 1893, although their
game would take much too long to
spread.
Reading those first 13 rules – and
remember they were written in about
an hour – shows some foresight into
the best and worst possibilities of basketball.
Along with Naismith’s intent
on keeping the Christian game and
participants healthy and “clean,” as
we say in the modern vernacular.
Players could not run with the
ball. There was no dribbling. No
shouldering, holding, tripping or
striking would be allowed. The first
infringement was a foul. The second
would disqualify a player until the
next goal was made.
Think that over. Commit a second
foul and your team is short a
player until the next goal. The good
news is the original game had nine
players on a side – there were only 18
people in the whole class – so losing a
teammate or two was not so damaging.
Also – and again think of this
in the modern game – if either side
made three consecutive fouls it would
count as a goal for the other team. It
does sound quite Christian.
Here was another rule with
larger implications. If a ball went out
of bounds, it would be thrown back
into play by the first person touching
it. Which indicates a mad scramble
off the court and into the spectators
with 18 people chasing an errant soccer
ball.
After thinking things over, Naismith
suggested the number of players
on a team should vary with court
size with the number fluctuating between
three and 40. He also invented
the “center jump” to start a game but
never imagined a pair of 7-footers