Today Google is celebrating the invention of my favorite sport, basketball. The inventor, James Naismith is featured in a Doodle watching kids play his game. James Naismith was a Canadian-American physical educator, physician, Christian chaplain, sports coach, and innovator.
He was born on November 6, 1861, Almonte, Mississippi Mills, Canada and passed on November 28, 1939, Lawrence, KS. He was married two times, Florence B. Kincaid (m. 1939–1939) and Maude Evelyn Sherman (m. 1894–1937). His first wife passed in 1937, and on June 11, 1939, he married his second wife. He had five children Helen Carolyn, John Edwin, James Sherman, Margaret Mason, and Maude Ann.
He was asked by his boss Dr. Luther Gulick, head of physical education of Springfield YMCA to come up with a new game within 14-days. He came up with new came named "Basket Ball." The first game of "Basket Ball" was played in December 1891. The Doodle shows Dr James Naismith watching the kids play the game, which he eventually coached for years.
Google wrote:
Today’s Doodle celebrates Canadian-American physical educator, professor, doctor, and coach Dr. James Naismith, who invented the game of basketball in 1891. On this day of the following year, Naismith announced the new game and its original rules in the pages of “The Triangle,” a Springfield College school newspaper. From its humble beginnings in a school gymnasium, the sport has grown into an international colossus played in over 200 countries today.
James Naismith was born on November 6, 1861, near the town of Almonte in Ontario, Canada. He earned a bachelor’s degree in physical education from McGill University, and in 1890 took a job as an instructor at the YMCA International Training College in Springfield, Massachusetts. Here, he was tasked to develop an indoor game that could occupy students during the unforgiving New England winters. With two peach baskets, a soccer ball, and just ten rules, the game of “basket ball” was born.
Introduced to Naismith’s class on December 21, 1891, the game initially featured teams of nine players and combined elements of outdoor sports such as American football, soccer, and field hockey. Despite initial skepticism, the sport exploded in popularity over the following years, and in 1936, basketball made its Olympic debut in Berlin, Germany. None other than the sport’s founder—James Naismith—threw the ball for the tip-off to commence the first game.
Naismith envisioned basketball as a way for all students to better themselves physically and mentally. The sport was introduced in a time when schools were segregated, but Naismith saw everyone as someone with potential for the game. In his lifetime, he took steps to help basketball reach more young people, and it has since evolved into a global phenomenon that crosses racial and gender barriers.
In 1959, the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame was incorporated in Springfield, Massachusetts, and this mecca of basketball history carries on Naismith’s legacy to this day.
Here’s to Dr. James Naismith—thank you for creating one of the world’s favorite pastimes!
I love that the Doodle is a GIF but was hoping it would be a shooting game.
Professor, doctor, coach, & the inventor of basketball–Dr. James Naismith had a career that was nothing but net 🇨🇦 🏀 🇺🇸
— Google Doodles (@GoogleDoodles) January 15, 2021
Discover how he went from bouncing around an idea for a winter game to laying up a global pastime!#GoogleDoodle → https://t.co/6Qnu1TcPbG pic.twitter.com/ltW6cK245B
Forum discussion at Twitter.
