William G. Morgan – Inventor of Mintonette (volleyball)

 

William G Morgan (23 January 1870 – 27 December 1942) Inventor of Mintonette (aka Volleyball)

 
On February 9, 1895 William G. Morgan a YMCA physical education director in Holyoke, Massachusetts unveiled his new game called Mintonette. Mintonette was designed by Morgan as an indoor game, that combined a little of tennis, you hit a ball over a net and a little of handball – no racquets you just used you hands. The game was invented about four years after basketball was introduced in the area by James Naismith in Springfield Mass.Morgan had met Naismith while Morgan was studying at Springfield College, Massachusetts in 1892. Both Naismith and Morgan pursued careers in Physical Education at the YMCA. Morgan designed Mintonette to be less rough than basketball, to be suitable for older members of the YMCA, but so that it still required some athletic effort.
During the first exhibition match played in 1896, Alfred Halstead, noticed the volleying nature of the game, the game quickly became known as “Volley ball” and later, of course, the two words united to form the game’s final name volleyball. The original Mintonette match was held at the International YMCA Training School. (now called Springfield College). From Wikipedia…

The first rules, written down by William G Morgan called for a net 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m) high, a 25 ft × 50 ft (7.6 m × 15.2 m) court, and any number of players. A match was composed of nine innings with three serves for each team in each inning, and no limit to the number of ball contacts for each team before sending the ball to the opponents’ court. In case of a serving error, a second try was allowed. Hitting the ball into the net was considered a foul (with loss of the point or a side-out)—except in the case of the first-try serve. Read More

Beach volleyball didn’t become a FIVB-endorsed sport until 1987 and it became an Olympic sport in 1996. Nudists fell in love with the sport in the roaring 20s, when they organized regular organized play in their clubs. By the 1960s, a volleyball courts had become standard in almost all nudist/naturist clubs!