James Naismith Character Analysis

Urbanization in the late nineteenth century caused white middle class Americans to face a crisis of gender, racial and class status (Harris, 2014, p.1). With fear of young men and women absorbing improper values and behaviour from the urban life, middle class reformers developed increasingly sophisticated physical education programs to promote clean sport and the development of character (Harris, 2014, p.2). As an instructor at the YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts, James Naismith was originally tasked with keeping physical education students active through the winter (Harris, 2014, p.3). The goal was to provide them with a challenging, vigorous activity that could be played indoors while still promoting a clean sport, Christian values and the development of courage, which was essential for every true gentleman at the time (Naismith,
Naismith’s first participants were not teenagers, but rather young men in their twenties and thirties studying to be secretaries at the YMCA (Harris, 2014, p.3). Naismith first considered bringing outside games indoors; however, sports like rugby and soccer were too rough for the gymnasium (Frazier, et al., 1998, p. 37). For this reason, Naismith's solution was to develop a team sport that was non contact and readily available.
This emphasis on character growth and the development of a man into a gentleman, is what influenced James Naismith to create the game of Basketball in 1891 (Harris, 2014, p.1). Moreover, men would desire to play it for benefits other than just physical activity. Loyalty, self control, self sacrifice and teamwork, the foundations of Christianity and altruistic Christian manhood, were the moral principles that basketball originally promoted (Carroll, 2003, p. 197).