YMCA 1891 James Naismith, a Canadian American, invented basketball while studying at the YMCA International Training School in Springfield, Massachusetts (later to be named Springfield College). Naismith had been asked to invent a new game in an attempt to interest pupils in physical exercise. The game had to be interesting, easy to learn, and easy to play indoors in winter. Such an activity was needed both by the Training School and by YMCAs across the country. Naismith and his wife attended the 1936 Summer Olympics when basketball was one of the Olympic events. In 1895 William G. Morgan from the YMCA
James Naismith (chemist) investigates: His research has been funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Medical Research Council (MRC), the Wellcome Trust and the European Union. Naismith was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2014. His nomination reads: Naismith is also Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC), the Royal Society of Biology (FRSB), the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE), the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci), an elected member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) and in 2016 was elected a Fellow of the American Association