A Brief History of Squash

April 4, 2024by Reza Kalamadeen0
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For the squash lovers out there, I’m sure you have all been dying to know the origins of this beautiful sport!

Well, before squash (and tennis) were even on the horizon, sometime around 1150, there was a game in France called ‘le pauem’ (the palm of the hand) played with a stretched tennis bat. Over many centuries this slowly evolved, and by the late 1600’s, tennis was born.

The Origin of Squash, Prison!

The earliest jump from tennis into the world of Squash can be traced back as far as the early 1800’s in Fleet Prison, London! Yes, it was a game created by prisoners to vent their anger and frustration, so judging by some of the players, it wasn’t too different from today! They were probably not hardened criminals as Fleet Prison was a Debtors Prison, so it ‘housed’ people who got into debt. I guess if it was a ‘real’ prison with murderers, squash would be an entirely different game! Anyway, one of the ways these ‘white collar’ inmates passed the time was by hitting a ball against walls, sometimes in the corner, so they were able to use the sidewall. They called the game ‘Racquets’. (They were only 2 more walls away from squash!)

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Drunk to play

Racquets grew in popularity and were played in alleys behind pubs before spreading to schools. It does make you wonder how drunk people were when they played! Alleys are not the same now as they were back in the ‘old days’. I guess they were dirty, uneven and quite smelly! You would have to be drunk to play!

From smelly alleys, the game grew in popularity and by around 1830, pupils at the prestigious Harrow School in London discovered that a punctured ball gave them a better way of controlling the ball. The rules remained the same as Racquets, but they called them ‘baby racquets’, ‘soft racquets’, ‘softer’ or even ‘mini racquets’. It took them a while to call the game Squash – no one knows for sure, but the commonly acknowledged reason for the name is that it derived from the noise the ball made when it hit the front wall. Personally, I’d like to believe this version too!

The way to prestigious schools

The first actual (closed) squash courts were built in 1864 in Harrow School with four courts on the site of the fifth form open court and on the 20th January 1865 the courts were officially ‘opened’ with an exhibition match between Billy Dyke (later known as Sir William Hart Dyke!) and a professional from Torquay (UK)! I still haven’t been able to establish his name or what he was a professional in as squash was only in its infancy! There was still no standardisation in court sizes but that didn’t stop the spread of Squash across the Atlantic to America. 

Hyde Clark, a graduate of Harrow School attended Columbia University in New York where he befriended Jay Conover and spoke highly of this adaptation of Racquets. Jay Conover lobbied for the first squash courts to be built at St. Paul’s School in New Hampshire. Two outdoor courts were built and Squash was now international! There were slight differences; in England, they played with a soft ball whilst in America they preferred a harder ball and narrower court.

And rules there created

Finally, in 1886, the first set of rules were created but court sizes still differed. Harrow School decided that the 4 original courts were too small, so they re-modelled them into 3 larger courts in 1897, but it wasn’t until 1922 that court sizes were standardised!

The rest, they say, is history!

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