James Naismith and the First Basketball Game - Tales of Sports Foolishness (ep. 5)

On December 21, 1891, a YMCA instructor named James Naismith had his students play the first basketball game ever, in a tiny little gym in Springfield, Massachusetts. And so, to celebrate the anniversary of that sport’s creation - or, “Basketball Day” if you’re inclined - let’s recount what happened in the first basketball game in history, and how what happened in that game has lead to the sport that we see today.
It's Tales of Sports Foolishness!
Notes:
*Here is the University of Kansas page where you can hear the totality of James Naismith’s radio interview with Gabriel Heatter: exhibits.lib.ku.edu/exhibits/...
*I didn’t have time to include it in this video, but the reason basketball hoops have backboards is also really interesting. Because hoops were perched on railings and balconies in its early years, and because the sport was so rough at the time that it attracted rowdy fans, it became common for fans to reach out and interfere with teams’ shot attempts. So hoops started getting made with backboards, specifically to prevent fans from getting in the way of the action. Interesting, right?
*Note how basketball courts looked back in the day at the 14:30 mark. If you’ve ever wondered why a shot from the top of the free throw circle is called “the top of the key,” it’s because the markings on the floor used to resemble a key once upon a time. (Or a thermometer.)
*The illustration of the first game that you see a few times in this video was drawn by Genzaburo Ishikawa, a Japanese college student who was one of the 18 participants in the first ever basketball game. His illustration appeared in The Triangle, a monthly journal by the YMCA Training School, where the first ever public references to basketball were made.
*Shawn Fury wrote an interesting article about William R. Chase, the first person to make a basketball shot in history, which you can read here (barring link rot): / william-chase-the-man-...
*Another interesting read is this Sports Illustrated article from 2002 about James Naismith’s original rules, and how it is that they eventually wound up getting sold at an auction instead of living forever in the Basketball Hall of Fame: vault.si.com/vault/2002/11/25...
*Dec. 21 is also the day, in 2012, that the world was supposedly going to end because it was the end of the Mayan calendar. This has nothing to do with the video, but it's funny to me that the day people thought the world was going to end was also basketball's birthday.
Music courtesy of: Windows Nashville ‘96 ( / windowsnashville96 , sunsetgrid.bandcamp.com/)
Thumbnail by: FORGE ( / digital4rge )
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This is 𝐓𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐒𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐬 𝐅𝐨𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬: a video essay series in which I, Velodus, dig deep on sports figures in history who were either obscure or whose stories were not getting nearly enough attention at the time these videos were made. If you're a huge fan of sports history, or if you're just a fan of well-researched, tightly-edited video essays, you might dig these videos - and if so, be sure to press that subscribe button.

[@adamwb8302]

As a huge fan of cage ball and pro cagers this was a great video.

[@velodus]

haha. Thanks man! Gotta love the ole cage game

[@Turbovolver]

This was really interesting! And well told, and professionally put together. This channel remains criminally underrated.

[@velodus]

Awe thanks man! Yeah, the YT algorithm hasn't been kind to me, but I'm still trying, haha

[@mardies5753]

Could not have put it better myself. It indeed is underated, this video should have thousands of likes. I didn't know any of this info. This is great.

[@LiamRproductions]

This was fascinating! I never knew anything about this. Really cool.

[@roycehuffman399]

Great video. It was especially amazing to hear Dr. Naismith's voice!

[@velodus]

As a heads up, there will be a follow-up video to this TOSF vid posted in a couple days too. A mini episode 5.5 if you will.

[@maverick3716]

How does this only have 13 comments. 🐐 23

[@decommunicate]

Even as someone who doesnt like sports, this was very interesting!

[@velodus]

Thanks, that's awesome! It's great to hear that from someone who's not big into sports, since I try to pick topics for these that aren't *too* sport-y for non-sports fans.

[@studioofshred1050]

0:14 "it's all perfect" dude missed that shot

[@mardies5753]

I saw that ha! I was like huh? He is all celebrating and doesn't realize he missed

[@pedromota2043]

Here because Hoodville/SportsVille small Reel .

[@velodus]

Awesome! I'm not familiar with that. Is that a podcast?

[@jackguyett9237]

Movie at the end?