She Invented The Sport Of Newcomb Ball In 1893, Which Paved The Way For The Creation of Volleyball Just Two Years Later
Volleyball has been around since 1895, so chances are that you’ve probably at least heard of it, if not participated in the game yourself.
William G. Morgan is credited as the creator of volleyball. He was a YMCA director in Massachusetts and came up with the idea so that people who found basketball too strenuous could engage in a lighter exercise.
Two years before volleyball, the sport of Newcomb Ball was invented by a professor of physical education at Sophie Newcomb College in New Orleans named Clara Gregory Baer.
Evidence suggests that Newcomb Ball laid the framework for Morgan’s concept of volleyball. Baer developed Newcomb Ball as a way to provide physical activity for women who didn’t have much opportunity to play a sport.
She had a passion for exercise starting at a young age. As a sickly child, she was often encouraged to engage in “tomboyish activities” to gain strength and bolster her health. She came to love playing in the outdoors.
During college, she trained in physical education, and after graduating, she was hired as a physical education teacher at Newcomb. She also took the position of Women’s Gymnastics Director at the Southern Athletics Club while teaching at Newcomb.
In 1889, the club began allowing the female relatives of male members to use the gymnasium for a few hours per week. They decided to employ a female teacher to encourage the women to participate in forms of exercise, so that’s when Baer came onto the scene and helped to successfully increase involvement.
Within two years of being at Newcomb, Baer established the first physical education certification program in the South. She also created the first bachelor’s degree program for physical education. During the 1893-94 school year, she came up with Newcomb Ball.
She needed an alternative sport to help strengthen her students’ reflexes and hand-eye coordination while they waited for an order of basketball hoops to arrive.
batuhan toker – stock.adobe.com- illustrative purposes only
The rules of the game were simple: two teams were divided on either side of the court, and one team would throw the ball to the other team, where they would catch or miss the ball. If the ball touched the floor within the boundary lines without being caught, a point would be scored.
Her students ended up loving the game, so they continued to play it even after the basketball hoops arrived. Newcomb Ball became so popular that at the beginning of the twentieth century, it actually became a varsity sport in some states. She was celebrated for establishing a culture of sports and physical education for women in the South.
Baer even presented her invention at a national convention, where Morgan was also in attendance. So, it was likely that Morgan knew about Newcomb Ball and tweaked some of the rules for his own game of volleyball.
Newcomb Ball did not achieve the fame that volleyball did for several reasons. For one, it was created and favored by women and deemed as “feminine.” Additionally, the game itself was not particularly difficult as it aimed to improve women’s health and was not all about fierce competition.
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