There’s no denying that pickleball is enjoying a surge of popularity right now. A new glossy magazine, In Pickleball, recently launched, touting itself as “the Vogue of Pickleball” and featuring a former star of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” wielding her pickleball paddle.
Fox Sports recently inked a deal to broadcast a minimum of 12 PPA (Professional Pickleball Association) tournaments through the end of the 2022 tour season — including the PPA Masters set for Dec. 11, 2022, in La Quinta.
But the sport just didn’t come out of nowhere. Fact is, pickleball has been around for more than 50 years — almost as long as skateboarding. Impress your friends on the court (or at happy hour afterward) with some backstory of the game. We’ll break it down for you: When and where did pickleball begin? And how did it get such a goofy name?
The game originated in 1965 near Seattle on Bainbridge Island, Washington. According to USA Pickleball, the three dads – Joel Pritchard, Bill Bell, and Barney McCallum -- are credited with creating the game because their kids were bored with their usual summertime activities.
Pritchard was a businessman who later served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives in the 1970s and ‘80s, and as lieutenant governor of Washington in the ‘80s and ‘90s. Bell was in the nickel business. McCallum was a World War II Navy vet who later launched printing and envelope businesses in Seattle.
One day, Pritchard and Bell went golfing and came home to find Joel’s 13-year-old son, Frank, in a sour mood. Frank would later recall: “I was bitching to my dad that there was nothing to do on Bainbridge. He said that when they were kids, they’d make games up.” Frank taunted his dad, “Oh, really? Then why don’t you go make up a game?”
Pritchard relished a challenge. He and Bell took off to the backyard badminton court where the 44 x 20-foot regulation court had been paved by Pritchard’s parents. They grabbed a plastic perforated ball and a pair of ping-pong paddles, set up the badminton net, grabbed the ball and improvised the first game.
The paddles didn’t hold up well, so they enlisted McCallum, a neighbor with a knack for being handy. He fashioned more reliable and attractive paddles. Soon, he became a key player in figuring out the game’s equipment and rules.
Many people think pickleball was named after the Pritchard family dog named Pickles. But according to an exhaustive history by USA Pickleball, the dog didn’t come along until 1968, three years after the game began. “Pickle,” it turned out, was borrowed from the rowing sport called crew.
In those regattas, the more lowly rowers who were not part of the starter boats would sometimes be thrown together and compete in a just-for-fun competition known as a “pickle boat” race. Because the new sport that Pritchard, Bell and McCallum had developed was a motley mashup of table tennis and badminton, Pritchard’s wife started calling the game “pickle ball.”
After their families and other Bainbridge Island residents got enthused about the made-up game, Pritchard, Bell and McCallum saw a business opportunity and in 1972 each put in $500 to get a company, Pickle-ball Inc., selling paddles, nets and balls.
Today, you can still buy from Pickle-ball Inc., but you can also pick up pickleball equipment at racquet sports shops like Pete Carlson’s Golf and Tennis in Palm Desert, at major retailers like Big 5, and of course, Amazon. The original paddles were made of wood, and you can still buy wood paddles for around $10 to $12 at places like Walmart. But most players today use graphite and polymer paddles that start around $20 and go up to more than $400.
There’s no need to get fancy at the beginning. Just get a basic paddle and a pack of balls.
Note that balls come in two major types, one for indoor competition and one for outdoor. To a novice, they can look interchangeable, but outdoor pickleballs have a harder and heavier body designed to resist wind, and feature 40 drilled holes. Indoor pickleballs are lighter and have fewer holes. Just something to know when you are getting started!
