HISTORY OF RACQUETBALL
In the 1940’s a man named Joseph G. Sobek got tired of how hard handball was on his hands. He was dissatisfied with the indoor sports. He worked at a rubber factory in Bridgeport, CT when he decided to start a new sport. He lived in Greenwich, CT and was professional tennis player and a pro squash and handball player.
It is said that in 1949, Sobek and a partner began playing with a paddle and combined the rules of handball and squash to play what they called “paddle racquets.” He then decided to change from a paddle to a racquet itself using a tennis racquet as a model. He made 25 to sell to his friends to start the sport. There was one problem though; there were faults in the ball. Sobek then found a Spalding ball made for children that work well. He bought a lot of them and sold him to his friends in 1950 to keep his sport from dwindling out. Sobek eventually started his own company to make his own ball to his exact specifications for the game.
In 1952 Sobek started the Paddle Racquet Association. He then put together a set of rules and printed them out and started putting together a promotional package for his Paddle Racquet to different YMCA’s to promote the sport. He also set up clinics so that new players could learn how to play the sport.
In 1968, Sobek started talking to the head of the US Handball Association, Robert Kendler. In 1968 the National Paddle Racquet Association held the very first racquetball tournament called the Gut-Strung Paddle Rackets National Championship. It was held in Milwaukee. The next year Kendler started the International Racquetball Association, and racquetball got its official name.
To help get the name of the sport out and bring more players in Sobek kept doing his clinics to teach the new players. Kendler used the Handball magazine, ACE, to advertise the sport and tell people about the game in articles and advertisements. Then the International Racquetball had their first tournament in St. Louis in 1969. Then after the tournaments the sport saw a lot of new players in the 1970’s. The games equipment sale went through the roof and more and more companies began making the equipment. By 1974, there were over 3 million racquetball players in the U.S.
In 1973, Kendler separated himself from the IRA, do to disputes in the board, he went on to start the National Racquetball Club and the US Racquetball Association, which both of them went bankrupt in the early 1980’s though.
As a child, Ishmael Beah seemed like he was playful, curious, and adventurous. He had a family that loved him, and he had friends that supported him. Before the war, Ishmael had a childhood that was similar to most of the children in the United States. Unfortunately, the love and support Ishmael grew accustom to quickly vanished. His childhood and his innocence abruptly ended when he was forced to grow up due to the Sierra Leone Civil War. In 1991, Ishmael thought about survival rather than trivial things. Where was he going to go? What was he going to eat? Was he going to make it out of the war alive? The former questions were the thoughts that occupied Ishmaels mind. Despite his efforts, Ishmael became an unwilling participant in the war. At the age of thirteen, he became a
This psychological memoir is written from the eyes of Ishmael Beah and it describes his life through the war and through his recovery. War is one of the most horrific things that could ever happen to anyone. Unwilling young boy soldiers to innocent mothers and children are all affected. In most instances the media or government does not show the horrific parts of war, instead they focus on the good things that happen to make the people happy and not cause political issues. In his book A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah dispels the romanticism around war through the loss of childhood innocence, the long road of emotional recovery and the mental and physical affects of war.
Ishmael starts his journey with a will to escape and survive the civil war of Sierra Leone in order to reunite with his mom, dad, and younger siblings, who fled their home when his village was attacked by rebels. Having only his older brother, who he escaped with, and a few friends by his side Ishmael is scared, but hopeful. When the brothers are captured by rebels, Ishmael’s belief in survival is small, as indicated by his fallible survival tactics when he “could hear the gunshots coming closer…[and] began to crawl farther into the bushes” (Beah 35). Ishmael wants to survive, but has little faith that he can. He is attempting to survive by hiding wherever he can- even where the rebels can easily find him. After escaping, Ishmael runs into a villager from his home tells him news on the whereabouts of his family. His optimism is high when the villager, Gasemu, tells Ishmael, “Your parents and brothers wil...
In 1995, some legendary tennis players such as Martina Navarotilova, Chris Avert, founded Women's Sports Legends Foundation. In 1997, seven more players joined this group with several common goals of marketing themselves as ambassadors for women and sports. They pooled their resources and called on their individual talents as players, teachers, entertainers and leaders.
During the war, people struggle to differentiate their enemies from friends causing people to act on fear. Survival is paramount and trusting someone can lead to the deaths of an entire village. Beah wrote,”Many times during our journey were surrounded by muscular men with machetes who almost killed us before realizing we were children just running away from war.” (Page 72, Chapter 8). War causes people to be on edge and trust is no longer a connection but a reason that could end a person's life. The major theme in “A Long Way Gone” is survival and acting based on an emotional concept can cost atrocities.
At the time that Althea was emerging as a recognized tennis player, African American’s opportunities were somewhat limitied. One organization called the American Tennis Association provided tounament opportunities for African American tennis players. In 1942, Althea Gibson had her first landmark
Ishmael Beah had a broken family, with divorced parents, living with his younger brother, Ibrahim, his older brother, Junior, along with his mother, and had slim to none communication with his father due to his stepmom. “I had not seen him for a while, as another stepmom had destroyed our relationship.” (10) Before gaining knowledge of any type of war approaching his village, Ishmael, Junior, and they’re mutual friend Talloi left town on a voyage to participate in a talent show in the town of Mattru Jong, where the boys would perform a dance routine set to a track of American rap songs they obtained on a cassette. Once they discovered that their village had been under attack by rebels, who often carve the initials ‘RUF’, which stood for Revolutionary United Front, they quickly scurried back to their village in hopes of coming in contact with their family members. Talloi exclaimed, “We must go back and see if we can find our families before it is too late.” Unfortunately the boys were too late, and their families had fled in attempts to survive. Ishmael, and Junior were accompanied with four close friends whose bond...
...oss Laura Simms, a narrator and his forthcoming foster mom, and understands the significance of sharing his practice with the world in expectations of avoiding such terrors from happening to other youngsters and to other parts of the world. (chapter 20).Afterwards Ishmael revenues to Freetown, Sierra Leon, a rebellion by the RUF and the Soldierly outs the non-combatant government, and the warfare Ishmael has been escaping from catches up with him. After his uncle’s passing, Ishmael escapes Sierra Leon for nearby Guinea and finally makes his tactic to his different lifetime in the United States (chapter 21).
A champion was born unknowingly on September 2, 1952. A child was born to rise above his comrades. He was born James Scott Connors after his father. From the time he was barely three years old, no one could tell that little Jimmy was going to be a champion. Destined for glory his mother and grandmother knew that for Jimmy to be great he would have to work extremely hard. So everyday until Jimmy was a teenager his mother and grandmother would drill him with tennis balls, seeing early that he had tremendous talent. Small for his age, Jimmy had to make up for it somehow. So while other children his age played with toys or watched T.V., Jimmy would be out on the tennis court working on his game. Jimmy wanted to be the best. He knew that his success depended on his speed and his technique.
It was Thanksgiving Day in 1887, and just like men would today, they were watching football. The alumni of Harvard and Yale got together to cheer on their former schools. After the game, a man from Yale, in celebration, picked up a boxing glove and tossed it across the room at the Harvard graduates. Using a broom handle one of the Harvard men hit the glove away. This gave George Hancock, one of the men who was gathered there for the game, an idea. He took two boxing gloves tied them together and made a large ball. Then he chalked out a small diamond, like the ones in baseball, and broke a broom handle to use as a bat (History). The group of twenty played the first game of what would become known as softball. After an hour, the game ended with a score of 41-40 (History). At the time the game was called indoor baseball, and became a popular sport in the city of it’s creation, Chicago (History).
of the sport was a game called rounders, which was played in England (Lewine 27). Players hit a ball with a bat, which is
A young African-American boy walks onto some rundown tennis courts at a local park with his father in Richmond, VA. Armed with an old wooden racket and a can of white tennis balls, his father begins to feed him some different shots and tells his son everything he knows about tennis. Being an African-American, this young boy did not have many friends that were as interested in tennis as he was. Since tennis is a predominantly white sport, Arthur Ashe’s desire to play was not encouraged by either race, but instead of giving up on the sport he loved, he continued playing to the dismay of many. Little did Ashe know, however, that his persistence would change the game forever. His efforts opened doors for many of the popular African-American tennis players, such as Serena and Venus Williams, MaliVai Washington, and Bryan Shelton. The class that he brought to the game of tennis and the bravery he showed by changing a sport dominated by whites made Arthur Ashe a legend in his own time.
The game of basketball is a highly recognized and widely known sport. Basketball was first heard of in the winter of 1891 when a man by the name of James Naismith was told to instruct a physical education class at the Young Men’s Christian Association in Springfield, Massachusetts. Naismith was instructed to put together a game for young men to enjoy while they were at the YMCA. While trying to come up with a brilliant and fun game for these young men, Naismith reminisced back on his childhood in Canada. He remembered a game his friends and him had played all the time: “Duck on a Rock”, which involved trying to knock a large rock off a boulder by throwing smaller rocks at it. Naismith also remembered watching a game of rugby going on in the gymnasium. The game of Rugby involved tossing a ball into a box. After a very short time of trying to make up a game for these young men, Naismith came up with a brilliant idea. Little did he know the game that he came up with just so happened to be one of he most renowned sports in American history. Naismith’s idea pertained to nailing up raised boxes so that players could attempt to throw a ball in the basket. When there were no boxes too be found, he used peach baskets. Supposedly, Naismith came up with all the rules for this game in no more than “about an hour”, according to Alexander Wolff. Shortly after Naismith had invented the game of basketball, graduates of the YMCA traveled internationally which is the main reason as to why this sport is so widely known. The impact basketball has made on the lives of many Americans is incredible in the sense that it has given people the ability to ...
The sport basketball was created in 1981 and has grown to be one of the most popular sports to be played worldwide. To think that this life altering activity was thought of by only one man, Dr. James Naismith, a Physical Instructor at the YMCA Training school. Which was in Springfield, Massachusetts. Naismith was under the instructions of the head physical education board when he had the brilliant idea. He was given an enduring two weeks to come up with an indoor game that would give an “athletic distraction” for a jumpy class to participate in through the harsh winter approaching them. All he had was his own mind and a small indoor space to some how create a new game to be played. Naismith succeeded and his creation is now a big time sport played by millions all around the world.
The history of volleyball goes back to the year of 1895. The game was invented by a man by the name of William G. Morgan, at a YMCA in Massachusetts (NCVA). Morgan was an instructor at the YMCA (Young Men’s Christian Association) when he created the game of volleyball (NCVA).