Holyoke, Massachusetts Honor Award for contributions of teams or organizations to volleyball, the William G. Morgan Award for outstanding support or promotion of the sport, and Mintonette Medallion of Merit Award in recognition of significant individual achievement, including coaches, referees, scorekeepers and other notable contributors to the sport. On February 9, 1895, William G. Morgan invented volleyball, originally known as "mintonette" for its similarity to badminton, at the Holyoke YMCA. Though the original YMCA building in which the sport was first played was lost to fire in 1943, the Greater Holyoke YMCA remains an active chapter. Today the Volleyball Hall of Fame
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