File:Dr._James_Naismith.jpg · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons
James Naismith
Sign in to saveAlso known as Narmal, James "Doc" Naismith, Doc Naismith
Canadian-American coach; inventor of basketball
James Naismith was a Canadian-American coach who invented the sport of basketball in 1891. His creation of basketball matters because it became one of the world's most popular sports, played by millions of people across all continents.
AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.
Person · Open Library
- Born
- 1861
- Died
- 1939
- Works
- 4
Top works
- Basket Ball - Its Origin And Development
- Basketball's origins
- Rules for basket ball
- Basketball
via Open Library + Wikidata
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- human
- Given name
- James
- Gender
- male
- Citizenship
- United States
- Place of birth
- Almonte
- Place of death
- Lawrence
- Occupation
- basketball player
- Employer
- University of Kansas
- Languages spoken
- English language
- Religion
- Catholicism
- Sport
- basketball
- Country for sport
- Canada
- Image
- Dr. James Naismith.jpg
- Height
- 179
Show 6 more facts
- Commons category
- James Naismith
- date of birth
- 1861-11-06
- date of death
- 1939-11-28
- writing language
- English language
- coach of sports team
- Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball
- name in native language
- James Naismith
Sources (3)
via Wikidata · CC0
~27 min read
Encyclopedic overview
James Naismith (/ˈneɪsmɪθ/ NAY-smith; November 6, 1861 – November 28, 1939) was a Canadian-American physical educator, physician, Christian chaplain, and sports coach, best known as the inventor of the game of basketball.
First developing the game in Canada, he wrote the original basketball rule book after moving to the United States and founded the University of Kansas basketball program in 1898. Naismith lived to see basketball adopted as an Olympic demonstration sport in 1904 and as an official event at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, and to see the birth of the National Invitation Tournament (1938) and the NCAA Tournament (1939). He also lived to see the creation of half of the leagues that eventually became the present-day National Basketball Association, with the 1935 creation of the Midwest Basketball Conference before it became the National Basketball League in 1937.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “James Naismith” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.