Today In History (Jan. 18)

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/today/today.html

On January 18, 1896, H.J. Kallenberg, an instructor of physical education at the University of Iowa, welcomed Amos Alonzo Stagg, athletic director at the recently founded University of Chicago, to Iowa City for an experimental game in a new sport. The contest, refereed by Kallenberg, was the first college basketball game played with five players on each side. The University of Chicago won by a score of 15 to 12.

Kallenberg had met Stagg at the Young Men's Christian Association (Y.M.C.A.) training school in Springfield, Massachusetts, where the two of them were students in 1890. In December 1891, Canadian-born James Naismith, an instructor of physical education at the school, invented the game of basketball.

Initially, players dribbled a soccer ball up and down a court of unspecified dimensions. Points were earned by landing the ball in a peach basket. Iron hoops and a hammock-style basket were introduced in 1893. Another decade passed, however, before the innovation of open-ended nets put an end to the practice of manually retrieving the ball from the basket each time a goal was scored.

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

@ it taking them 10 years to think about cutting a hole in the bottom of the basket.

That's probably how long it will take Pop to find us a SF under the age of 30.

[Solid D]

"Cut a hole in the bottom of the peach basket? Brilliant!!!"

[polandprzem]

[Ed Helicopter Jones]

@ it taking them 10 years to think about cutting a hole in the bottom of the basket.

Sounds like a great Aggie joke!

[TwoHandJam]

On January 18, 1896, H.J. Kallenberg, an instructor of physical education at the University of Iowa, welcomed Amos Alonzo Stagg, athletic director at the recently founded University of Chicago, to Iowa City for an experimental game in a new sport. The contest, refereed by Kallenberg, was the first college basketball game played with five players on each side. The University of Chicago won by a score of 15 to 12.

Kallenberg had met Stagg at the Young Men's Christian Association (Y.M.C.A.) training school in Springfield, Massachusetts, where the two of them were students in 1890. In December 1891, Canadian-born James Naismith, an instructor of physical education at the school, invented the game of basketball.

Initially, players dribbled a soccer ball up and down a court of unspecified dimensions. Points were earned by landing the ball in a peach basket. Iron hoops and a hammock-style basket were introduced in 1893. Another decade passed, however, before the innovation of open-ended nets put an end to the practice of manually retrieving the ball from the basket each time a goal was scored.

Canada rocks. Now if only wasn't so fvcking cold.