This is 99% invisible. I'm Roman Mars.

Tomorrow night, 15,000 cheering fans will pack Madison Square Garden in New York City

to witness a giant basketball double-headed.

In that cheering crowd sitting in row sea, seat 11, will be a modest 77-year-old man.

Those fans won't know that he made possible the game they're watching.

But you're going to meet him now. That tape is from an old New York radio show

called We The People. The guest is James Naismmith. 125 years ago in 1891,

Naysmith was a PE instructor at a small college in Springfield, Massachusetts

when a particularly bad snowstorm struck.

For days the students couldn't go outdoors.

So they began rough housing in the halls.

We tried everything to keep them quiet.

Something had to be done. One day I had an idea. I called

the boys to the gym, divided them up into teams of nine and gave them an old soccer ball.

I showed them two peach baskets I had

nailed up at each end of the gym. I told them the idea was to throw the ball

into the opposing team's peach basket.

A lot of sports don't have such a definitive point of origin, but this one does.

I blew a whistle and the first game of basketball began.

That day in 1891, James Naismith invented basketball.

And what rules did you have for your new game, Dr. Naysman?

Well, I didn't have enough, and that's where I made my big mistake.

...