From the Almonte Gazette July 30, 1970

Dr. James Naismith The Inventor of Basketball

            On Saturday afternoon, June 28, 1965 , a plaque was unveiled at 2:30 p.m. in honour of the late Dr. James Naismith, Inventor of basketball  at his boyhood home, now owned by Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Grace on the 9th line of Ramsay, opposite the Clayton turn.      

The ceremony was held under the auspices of Ramsay Women’s Institute and the public were cordially invited to attend.   

Below is a short biography of Dr. James Naismith, which was written by MRS. HOLLIE LOWRY, at the time.   

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The parents of James Naismith, the inventor of basketball, were Margaret Young and John Naismith. They, with their little family lived  a short time in a white stuccoed house on the farm belonging to young Mrs. Naismith’s father, Robert Young, lot 22, west half, concession 9.          

They moved to Quyon, Que., where they lived until typhoid fever claimed both young parents in death in the fall of 1870, both aged 37 years. The children, Annie, about 11 years old, James about 8 and Robert about 3 years old, came back to live with their uncle, Peter J., their grandmother and a young aunt. The grandfather Young had died in July, 1870.

After the passing away of the grandmother and the marriage of the aunt, Jim’s sister, young Annie Naismith. with the help of another young girl was able to manage the housekeeping. Annie remained un-married and continued to keep house for her uncle, first on the farm and also after they moved to Almonte when Mr. Oates bought the farm.   

The Naismith children attended the Bennie's Corners School taught by Mr. Caswell. It was a long walk so they used to cut across the fields. Jim liked to play hockey and skate but had no skates, so he made a pair of wooden skates such as were used at that time. He took two pieces of old files which he sharpened on the grindstone. These he fastened between two pieces of wood and strapped them to his feet. While quite young he decided that helping others was the only way to find satisfaction.     

As a young man he worked as a hired man with neighbours until he was 22, before he had enough money to start at McGill University. At nights he would read and study books to prepare himself, borrowing books from his neighbours. He had attended High School for a while and then was out of school for four years before going back, largely through the influence of Tait McKenzie.       

He taught school for a short time in the 10th line school, S.S. # 15, when the teacher, Mr. Young had to quit because of his health. He attended Almonte High School along with Tait McKenzie. He decided to become a Presbyterian Minister and went to McGill in Montreal.          

Lacking a complete formal High School education he put all his energies into his studies. The first two months he studied almost continuously. Two young men from higher classes called on him and warned him that he was studying too hard and needed to get some exercise and relaxation. He hardly looked up from his book, but said, “That’s what I thought, too, but now look at me.” He had been paying up with ill health for two years from overwork. The advice sank in. 

The next Saturday afternoon he went for a walk on the campus and came upon a football team practising. The boy played centre got hurt in the scrimmage, his nose was bleeding badly. Football was pretty informal in those days, and there were no more substitute players then. They asked if someone standing by would take his place. When none of the senior students offered, Jim Naismith stepped forward. The captain threw him the ball. At the next game he was on the team and stayed on it all through his seven college years for Arts and Theology.         

Once when this student minister had to preach, he turned up with two black eyes, received in a football game with Ottawa. He received a gold medal when he graduated.    

            In his last year in theology in the Presbyterian College at Montreal he was employed as a physical instructor at McGill.       

All the way through his seven college years in McGill and Montreal Presbyterian College, he took an active part in all kinds of sport, in debating, singing, etc., and won many honours.                  

            When he graduated as a Presbyterian minister in 1890, at 28, he decided after talking things over with one of his professors to go to Springfield, Mass. to take a year’s course in Y.M.C.A. training school, now Springfield College. The Y.M.C.A. work had started some years before and was just beginning to be important in Canada and the U.S.A.       

On completing his training in 1891, he became assistant professor in Physical Education there. Here he worked with Dr. Guillick, who founded the Girl Scouts of America (in U.S.A. of Girl Guides). He also worked here with Dr. Stragg, the father of Modern Football, who was still alive in 1964. James Naismith found that there was nothing much but plain exercises to do after the football season was over. Dr. Guillick suggested that he think of some game to play indoors without the injuries that boxing, wrestling and tumbling caused. A few days later Professor Naismith gave a set of rules for the new game. These five rules are still used as the basis of basketball. He invented many, many other things including a way of testing if a student had been drinking.  One young  man who played on the first team was still alive in 1961 at the age of 88 years, a retired Presbyterian Minister, Dr. Hildner. He remembers helping Professor Naismith to nail the peach baskets to the balcony of the gymnasium. Later the bottoms were knocked out from the peach baskets. Once when he visited Mexico, he saw children playing the game with bar-gourd for a ball.           

The game spread like wildfire. Naismith’s students went to summer camps and taught this game. Those attending went home and got teams started at the Y.M.C.A.‘s and in High Schools and Colleges. As it only needed a ball and two hoops it became common in Church groups. One was organized, the first, in Cleveland in 1905 and is going yet. Hundreds of letters came in asking for the rules of the game. Naismith and Dr. Guillick compiled a book of rules that became the base manual of the game. In seven years it was translated to Chinese in Shanghai.

James Naismith went to the University of Cleveland, Ohio doing Y.M.C.A. work and studying about the human body. He became a M.D. in 1898, but he never practised medicine, just as he seldom preached from a pulpit. However, he never lost sight of his high calling and for years he conducted a Bible Class every week of more than 300 students. In 1892 a group of girls at Springfield formed a basketball team and playing in long dresses with leg of mutton sleeves and some with even a hint of a bustle. Dr. Naismith was invited to come and see them play. Later he married one of this team. They had two sons and one daughter. They were married forty years when she died at 67 in Kansas of a heart attack after she had been ill for years.          

In 1936, three years before his death, a Naismith week was declared and basketball players all over the U.S.A. collected money and sent Dr. Naismith to the Olympic games in Berlin, when he saw his game played  by 33 nations. He had helped to build strong healthy bodies in thousands of young people who learned to play happily together in a game where they were not likely to injure themselves or each other. People realize that he did much good service to his God by helping young people to build strong healthy minds in strong healthy bodies. Recognizing this fact the Presbyterian College in Montreal bestowed upon him the Honourary degree of Doctor of Divinity. So he was James Naismith, M.D. and D.D.

On the centenary of his birth in 1961 the United States issued a postage stamp in his honour. The first stamps went to his family.