Appears in SLAM Issue 238. Published on June 16, 2022 at slamonline.com
On the East bank of the St. Croix River sits a small milltown of around 4,500 people. In St. Stephen, New Brunswick, Canada, a portal to the 19th century lies dormant while a town rallies together to transform some old wooden panels into a basketball experience center. What’s so special about those old wooden panels? They belong to the oldest basketball court in the world.
In 1893, one of James Naismith’s original 18 players, Lyman Archibald, introduced the game to St. Stephen after being hired to run the local YMCA in New Brunswick. Formerly a pharmacy, print shop and thrift store, the building became abandoned and was hidden away for decades before a fire in 2010 forced the former owners to rip up the storage room carpet, revealing strips of faded wooden panels.
Canada First Basketball Inc. was created with the hopes of reinvigorating the space and St. Stephen. Last January, a phase one goal of $1 million in funding was met and the team was one step closer to achieving their dream of building a replica of the 1893 court.
“I was left with the strong impression that it’s not the building, it’s the story about the building and about the game that we need to develop and save,” Richard Fulton, president of Canada First Basketball Inc., tells SLAM. (READ THE FULL STORY HERE.)