Historedia
Episode 1 of 4

Invention of Basketball

When
December 1891
Where
International Young Men's Christian Association Training School
Part of
James Naismith invents basketball at Springfield, December 1891

Naismith designed basketball in December 1891 to keep his gym class active on a rainy day at the YMCA Training School.

Naismith, a Canadian-American instructor, created the game in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1891. He wrote the original rules, which are considered basketball's founding document. The first game was played in December 1891, establishing the sport's origins.

Sources

  1. Basketball Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-08
  2. James Naismith Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-29
  3. Springfield College Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-24

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.