The international game of netball can trace its popularity and codification to a unique college of Swedish gymnastics in the United Kingdom at the turn of the nineteenth century. The all-female college was also at the heart of the development of both the physical education and physiotherapy professions.<\/p>\n
In 1891 in Springfield, Massachusetts a 30-year-old Canadian immigrant to the USA, James Naismith, invented a new indoor game for young men at the School for Christian Workers (later the YMCA). Most games played by high-spirited young men produced significant injury rates, so Naismith conjured up a game whereby a ball had to be lobbed into a high peach basket. His reasoning being that if a ball had to dropped into the \u2018goal\u2019, it couldn\u2019t be thrown at breakneck speed.<\/p>\n
Initially the game had nine players on each team \u2013 three guards, three centres and three forwards. This was based solely on Naismith having eighteen boys to keep occupied.<\/p>\n
Basketball was a success and four years later Clara Baer, a sports teacher in New Orleans, wrote to Naismith asking for a copy of the rules. The package she received contained a drawing of the court with further lines penciled across it, to show the areas various players could best patrol. Baer misinterpreted the lines and thought players couldn\u2019t leave those areas and were to remain in their zones. Netball or \u2018women\u2019s basketball\u2019 as it was known was born.<\/p>\n
Women\u2019s basketball soon crossed the Atlantic and was first played in England at Madame \u00d6sterberg\u2019s College for physical education teachers.<\/p>\n
Xylograph of Martina Bergman-\u00d6sterberg published in Idun in 1890.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Martina Bergman-\u00d6sterberg was born in 1849 in Hammarlunda, rural Sweden. Educated at home, she was first employed as a governess and later, a librarian. In 1879, \u00d6sterburg commenced a two-year course at the Royal Central Gymnastics Institute in Stockholm, studying pedagogical (physical education) and medical (physiotherapy) gymnastics from the work of Pehr Henrik Ling.<\/p>\n
In 1881 \u00d6sterberg was appointed to the London School Board as Lady Superintendent of Physical Exercises in Girls\u2019 and Infants\u2019 schools. She was the successor of another Swede, Concordia L\u00f6fving, a fellow graduate of the Royal Central Gymnastics Institute in Stockholm. The appointment of Swedish nationals in the role occurred because at the time no English-born teacher possessed sufficient qualifications to teach physical education.<\/p>\n
\u00d6sterberg was responsible for the instruction of female physical training teachers and with certifying their competence. During her appointment she trained over 1,000 teachers in Swedish gymnastics, anatomy and physiology, and pioneered a national system of physical training instruction. Most of her work focused on training educators for elementary school students, and during her time at the London School Board she introduced Swedish gymnastics to nearly 300 schools. By 1888 Swedish gymnastics was being taught by qualified teachers in girls\u2019 schools in every department of the London School Board.<\/p>\n
Dissatisfied with the bureaucracy at the London School Board, and feeling stifled in achieving her aims, \u00d6sterburg shifted towards teaching middle-class women to become physical training instructors. She developed a two-year course modelled on the Royal Central Gymnastics Institute in Sweden that included anatomy, physiology, chemistry, physics, hygiene, massage, theory of movement, dancing, deportment and remedial (medical) gymnastics. English team sports were also taught at The \u00d6sterburg College for their potential to teach an appreciation of space and time, discipline, reason, quickness and unselfishness (Oesterberg, 1911).<\/p>\n
In 1893, \u00d6sterberg returned from a visit to the United States, and informally introduced a version of women\u2019s basketball to her students at Hampstead. Two years later, an American lecturer by the name of Dr Toles more formally introduced women\u2019s basketball to \u00d6sterberg\u2019s students, however in the absence of suitable equipment wastepaper baskets were used for goals (Claydon 2021b). Substantial revisions were made during a visit in 1897 from another American teacher and graduate of the Central Institute of Gymnastics in Sweden, Miss Porter of Baltimore. By this time, the new sport had also acquired a new name of \u2018net ball\u2019 to reflect the transition from baskets to rings and nets. The game was also played on outdoor grass courts divided into three parts and a larger ball was used.<\/p>\n
In 1899 a group of \u00d6sterberg\u2019s graduate students formed The Ling Physical Education Association. Just as graduates of the Royal Central Institute of Gymnastics in Stockholm could work in either pedagogical (physical education) or medical (physiotherapy) gymnastics, so too did members of the Ling Association. However, over the next decade the two disciplines split into seperate professions with the Ling Association becoming the Physical Education Association of the United Kingdom. Meanwhile those graduates predisposed to medical (physiotherapy) gymnastics joined with the nurse-masseuse Society of Trained Masseuses (STM), who had become predominant in hospitals via their alliance with the medical profession. Acknowledging the contribution of their new gymnast partners, the masseuses of the STM changed their name to the Chartered Society of Massage and Medical Gymnastics, and in 1943 the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy (Nias, 2017).<\/p>\n
Back to the history of netball: As many of the students of the \u00d6sterberg College finished their training, and became gymnastic mistresses in far flung schools the need for uniform rules for netball became apparent. Several of the 1898 class graduates decided that the time had come to standardise the rules and publish them. It seemed fitting to them that the Association should take responsibility, so a subcommittee to codify the rules of netball was formed in 1900 (Claydon, 2021a). Their vision to develop a standard set of rules for netball, which could be used by all schools and groups wishing to play, was far reaching.<\/p>\n
In 1901 The Ling Association published 250 copies of the rule book. Next came a print run of 1000, increasing until they reached 2,500, with many sent to schools in England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales and to a few schools in France and South Africa (Claydon, 2021b).<\/p>\n
Netball\u2019s popularity continued to grow In the first half of the 20th century, with the game being played in many British Commonwealth countries. During a tour of England in 1957 by an Australian national team, discussions took place concerning standardising the rules of the sport internationally and this led to representatives from England, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and The West Indies meeting in Sri Lanka in 1960, to establish The International Federation of Women\u2019s Basketball and Netball. Formal rules were established at this inaugural meeting and it was decided to hold World Championship tournaments every four years, beginning in Eastbourne, England, in 1963.<\/p>\n
Netball has since become the most popular and widely played sport by women in Australia and New Zealand (Hess, 2022). Its cultural value, professional opportunities, and strong feminine identity have lodged it firmly as an integral component of women\u2019s athletics around the world.<\/p>\n
Claydon J. (2021a). The Ling Association Founded 1899. The \u00d6sterberg Collection. Accessed online at https:\/\/osterbergcollection.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/The-Ling-Association-rev.17.6.2021-web.pdf<\/a>.<\/p>\n Claydon J. (2021b). Madame Bergman \u04e6sterberg, her students and the Ling Association: Their influence on the development of Netball 1895\u20131930. The \u00d6sterberg Collection. https:\/\/osterbergcollection.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Netball-1895-1930-web.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n Hess R. (2022). Origin Stories: Tracing the Development of Netball in Victoria during the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century. The International Journal of the History of Sport<\/em>, 39<\/em>(13\u201314), 1436\u20131461.<\/p>\n Nias K. (2017). Negotiating intimacies: Gender, rehabilitation and professionalisation of massage in Britain, c.1880-1920. PhD thesis submitted to Exeter University.\u00a0 <\/span>Accessed online at<\/p>\n