Why Is Pickleball Called Pickleball?

The interesting story of how pickleball got its unusual name.

Make a guess - how did pickleball come to be called pickleball? Does it have anything to do with pickles, which are cucumbers soaked in brine or vinegar? Is it named after a person or a pet? Did they eat pickles at the first pickleball game? Let’s go back in time to 1965, when pickleball was founded by Joel Pritchard, Bill Bell and Barney McCallum on Bainbridge Island, Washington, USA.

So the popular story goes that the game was named after the Pritchards’ dog, Pickles. But that isn’t really the truth. According to interviews, records, and an article in Pickleball Magazine, Joan Pritchard was the one who came up with the name “pickle ball”, inspired by the term “pickle boat”, which refers to a motley crew of rowers who are thrown together to compete in races. These are the leftover rowers that didn’t make it to any of the starting crews, and they’d often come in last place. Pickleball was cobbled together using elements from badminton, tennis and table tennis in the summer of 1965, when Joel and Joan Pritchard were holidaying with their friends Bill and Tina Bell. Joan, a rowing fan, thought the game was like bits of different sports thrown together, just like the leftover rowers in a “pickle boat”, and thus, the name “pickle ball” was born.

Pickleball was invented when Joel and Joan Pritchard’s son Frank, then 13, was bored and challenged his dad to make up a game. Joel, who was then 40, and his friend Bill found a plastic perforated ball and a pair of table tennis paddles in the shed, and set the badminton net in the backyard badminton court. The first legendary game of pickleball was then played.

Some equipment improvements came shortly after when Barney McCallum, who lived nearby, constructed sturdier and better-looking paddles. He also became an important part of the game’s equipment, rules and formation.

“How about Pickles the dog?” you ask. Well, Pickles the cockapoo did exist, but he came only three years later, in 1968, when the Pritchards’ daughter Jeannie brought him home. The family was playing pickleball at the time and named the dog Pickles - of course!

The reason many think that pickleball is named after Pickles the dog, and not the other way round, is because of something Joel Pritchard said when he was interviewed by a  national publication. He mentioned both Pickles the dog and his wife Joan naming pickleball after pickle boats, but the canine story was the one that got published, as it was cuter and more memorable than the pickle boat tale.

And now you know - that name of pickleball came from a somewhat random rowing reference. Or you can go with the dog story. It doesn’t really matter, as long as we’re all enjoying the fun and dynamic sport that the Pritchards and their friends came up with all those years ago.