"In 2007, the International Scholar-Athlete Hall of Fame will host a special New England Basketball history exhibit. The exhibit will encompass memorabilia and other items which reflect the history and tradition of New England basketball. A special component of the exhibit will be the sale of "Our Game: A Story of New England Basketball" by acclaimed author, Bill Reynolds. "Our Game" is being published by Hall of Fame Press, a new entity of the Institute for International Sport."

Hall of Fame Press is publishing the book I'm writing with my mom. While visiting with the fine folks at the Institute for International Sport yesterday in Rhode Island, I took a peek at the above-described exhibit. Really fun hoops memorabilia there. This post is by no means a comprehensive photo gallery, but I snapped some interesting stuff. Check it out in person if you're in the Kingston, Rhode Island area. See the links above for more details. In the first shot--that's gotta be a peach basket. Click these to enlarge.

The 1921 URI men's team. URI was Rhode Island State College back then. Love those socks, and the "RI" logo.

The blurb below this picture says how it's still a tradition at Providence College for fans to gather for practice, as they're doing here in the 20s. Check out the knee pads, too.

More great socks, more knee pads, and the full year on the uniform. (I'd guess these weren't what they wore in games.) You can also see the "P" for Providence on their shorts.

A URI warm-up from 1991, with the centennial patch.

Women in action, with the classic short shorts of the 70s/80s.

This really shows the knee pads that were so common back in the day. And it appears this team didn't wear socks at all.

Somerville representin'.

You don't see the horizontally-striped shorts much nowadays. And this team's socks are clearly not part of the uniform. I think they just wore whatever socks they had. In another action photo which I didn't get a good shot of, this team (I see "H-W" on two of the balls, so it must be Hamilton-Wenham high school in Mass., still home of the Generals today) is playing another team with a wild, horizontal swath across their shorts. You'll just have to go to the museum to check that out...