Okay, so today I wanted to figure out who actually invented volleyball. It seemed like a simple question, but you know how these things go – down the rabbit hole I went!
Digging Around for the Truth
First, I hit up Google, obviously. Just typed in “founder of volleyball”. The first few results all pointed to the same guy: William G. Morgan. Seems straightforward enough, right?
But I wasn’t totally satisfied. I wanted to see if there were any other, like, lesser-known claims or maybe some controversy. So I started looking at some older articles and even a few online encyclopedias.
- I checked out some sports history websites.
- I even browsed through some digitized archives of old newspapers (that was a trip!).
I mean the old newpapers are so hard to read!
Confirming the Facts (and Learning More)
Everything I found kept leading back to William G. Morgan. He was a YMCA physical education director in Holyoke, Massachusetts. Apparently, back in 1895, he wanted to create a game that was less rough than basketball. He combined elements of basketball, baseball, tennis, and handball.
He originally called it “mintonette,” which, honestly, sounds kind of lame. Thankfully, someone suggested “volleyball” because, you know, you volley the ball. Much better, right?
So, after all that searching and reading, I’m pretty confident in saying that William G. Morgan is the guy who invented volleyball. It wasn’t some big, dramatic discovery, but it was a fun little history lesson for me. And hey, now I know who to thank for all those beach volleyball games!
