Sports in North America credited with creating the game of basketball in 1891. While working as a physical education professor and instructor at the International Young Men's Christian Association Training School (YMCA) (today, Springfield College) in Springfield, Massachusetts, U.S., he primarily created the game as a way to could keep his gym class active indoors on a rainy day. The sport quickly spread throughout the U.S. and Canada, with Naismith becoming instrumental in establishing college basketball. Today, the National Basketball Association (NBA), with teams in the U.S. and one in Canada, is widely considered to be the highest level of professional basketball in the
James Naismith His mother, Margaret Young, was born in 1833 and immigrated to Lanark County, Canada in 1852 as the fourth of 11 children. His father, John Naismith, was born in 1833, left Europe when he was 18, and also settled down in Lanark County. On June 20, 1894, Naismith married Maude Evelyn Sherman (1870–1937) in Springfield, MA, USA. The couple had five children: Margaret Mason (Stanley) (1895–1976), Helen Carolyn (Dodd) (1897–1980), John Edwin (1900–1986), Maude Ann (Dawe) (1904–1972) and James Sherman (1913–1980). He was a member of the Pi Gamma Mu and Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternities. Naismith was a Presbyterian minister,