The origins of the pumpkin
The history of squash began many centuries ago in France (around the year 1150) with a game called “le Pauem” (the palm of the hand), which became tennis at the end of the 15th century. At that time, people played similar games just for entertainment, just in narrow streets.
The next big step came in the early 19th century at the Fleet Prison in England. Prisoners played inside their cells, simply hitting the ball with their hands (and later rackets) and bouncing it off the walls. This game became known as “Rackets”.
These games were very popular in schools and from there squash itself was born. The first four courts were built at Harrow School in England in 1864 and the game was officially founded (the word “squash” comes from the noise the ball makes as it bounces off the front wall of the court).
Standardization
The sport still lacked any kind of standardization and that led to two branches of squash: one played with soft ball in England and the second with hard ball and a slightly narrower court in North America.
The first squash court in North America was built in 1884 in New Hampshire at St. Paul`s School and in 1907 the first national association was founded: the United States Squash Racquet Association (USSRA). The Canadian Squash Racquet Association followed in 1911 and in Great Britain the game was regulated by a subcommittee of the Tennis and Racquet Association; the Squash Racquet Association was finally formed in 1928.
The first professional world championship occurred in 1920 in England and later the sport began to spread throughout the world. In the 1960s and 1980s it was mainly due to the efforts of two of the greatest players of the time, Jonah Barington of Ireland and Geoff Hunt of Australia, who brought the game to the masses of people and started a huge boom in the sport.
modern age
The International Squash Racquet Association (ISRF) was founded in 1966 in London by representatives from Great Britain, the United States, Canada, Australia, India, Pakistan, New Zealand, South Africa and the United Arab Republic. In 1992, the ISRF was renamed the World Squash Federation (WSF), finally recognizing the name of the game as “Squash”, not “Squash Rackets”.
The WSF controls the rules, court specifications, rackets and other equipment, referees, and also training and education. It supports the coordination of squash events and organizes the World Championships. And lately, he has been working closely with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to incorporate squash into the Olympic program.
There are over 120 national squash associations under the WSF now. The game is now played in more than 150 countries on more than 49,000 courts, more than 17 million players are registered.
best players
One of the first great players in squash history was FD Amr Bey of Egypt, who won five British Open Championships in the 1930s. The next famous Egyptian came 15 years later: MA Karim won the title four times between 1947 and 1950. .
We’ve already mentioned Australia’s Geoff Hunt: During the 1960s and 1970s he won the British Open eight times.
And we can’t forget the legendary players from Pakistan: Jahangir Khan won the British Open a record ten times (1982-1992), Jansher Khan (eight times), Hashim Khan (seven times) and his dynasty.