Listening to James Naismith
Ever heard the great James Naismith talk about basketball? Very few had until a University of Kansas professor found an interview while researching a new book.
According to KU: "The interview of Naismith was on the radio program "We the People," hosted by Gabriel Heatter in New York, on Jan. 31, 1939. In the roughly three-minute clip, Naismith discusses setting up the first basketball game with two peach baskets in a gymnasium at the International YMCA Training School (now Springfield College) in Springfield, Massachusetts, in December 1891.
"Michael Zogry, associate professor in the Department of Religious Studies, found references to a brief radio interview with Naismith while researching his book in progress, Religion and Basketball: Naismith's Game."
The library's Sports neighborhood has a number of books and videos on Dr. Naismith and Jayhawk basketball.
A particularly good one is James Naismith: The Man Who Invented Basketball by Rob Rains and Hellen CarpenterA fascinating, in-depth biography shows how this young man who wanted to be a medical doctor, or if not that, a minister (in fact, he was both) came to create a game that has endured for over a century. Naismith invented basketball in part to find an indoor activity to occupy students in the winter months. When he realized that the key to his game was that men could not run with the ball, and that throwing and jumping would eliminate the roughness of force, he was on to something. And while Naismith thought that other sports provided better exercise, he was pleased to create a game that "anyone could play."
