Lably
Skip to content

American handball

US style ballgame

  • 10 min read
  • 8 chapters

Explore on Lably

ToursExplore Lably’s 3D tours

History

Games in which a ball is hit or thrown have been referenced as far back as Homer and ancient Egypt. A game similar to handball was played by Northern and Central Americans from 1500 BC, most famously by the Aztecs as the Mesoamerican ballgame, but no references to a rebound game using a wall survive. It is thought that these ancient games more closely resembled a form of hand tennis. Further examples of similar games include the European-originated games of Basque pelota (or Jai-alai), Gaelic handball, Valencian frontó, International fronton and Eton fives.

References to similar games (then referred to as either "hand-tennis" and "hand-ball") have been found as early as 1287, when the Synod of Exeter banned the game due to the damage it caused to church buildings. Other notable examples of wall ball games being banned include Robert Braybrooke, Bishop of London, who in 1385 prohibited the game. Another recorded game of striking a ball against a wall using a hand was in Scotland in 1427, when King James I ordered a cellar window in his palace courtyard to be blocked up, as it was interfering with his game. In Ireland, the earliest written record of a similar game is in the 1527 town statutes of Galway, which forbade the playing of ball games against the walls of the town. The first depiction of an Irish form of handball does not appear until 1785. The sport of handball in Ireland was eventually standardized as Gaelic handball. By the mid-19th century, Australians were playing a similar game, which developed into the modern sport of Australian handball.

American

In Treacherous Beauty, by Mark Jacob and Stephen H. Case, about the Arnold-Andre conspiracy, Major John André and General Sir Henry Clinton are said to have played a game called handball during the American Revolution. The earliest record of the modern game in the United States mentions two handball courts in San Francisco in 1873. The sport grew over the next few decades. By the early 1900s, four-wall handball was well established and a one-wall game was developed in New York City by beach-goers who hit bald tennis balls with their hands against the sides of the wooden jetties that lined beaches. This led to a rise in one-wall handball at New York beaches and by the 1930s, thousands of indoor and outdoor one-wall courts had been built throughout the city. American handball is seen predominantly in parks, beaches, and high school yards in New York City, Lynbrook, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago and other large urban areas.

National Championships

National championships in handball have been held annually in the United States since 1919. These championships were organized by the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) until 1950, when their control was transferred to the newly formed United States Handball Association (USHA). For a complete list of champions, see List of American Handball Champions in the United States, and List of American Handball Women's Champions in the United States.

Influence on racquetball and wall paddleball

The sports of racquetball, squash, fives, four-wall and one-wall paddleball were heavily influenced by handball. Four-wall and one-wall paddleball were created when people took up wooden paddles to play on handball courts. Four-wall paddleball was invented in 1930 by Earl Riskey, a physical-education instructor at the University of Michigan, when he came up with the idea of using paddles to play on the school's handball courts. Racquetball was invented in 1949 by Joseph Sobek in Greenwich, Connecticut, when he played handball using a strung racquet.

Sign in to keep reading

7 more chapters are free with a Lably account.

More in Sports, games and recreation

FIFAInternational governing body of association footballNational Collegiate Athletic AssociationNorth American athletic organizationMajor League SoccerProfessional soccer league in the United States and CanadaNASCARAmerican automobile racing companyCommonwealth GamesMulti-sport event involving athletes from the Commonwealth of NationsNew York YankeesMajor League Baseball franchise