APM Studios
May 28, 2025
Play ball! The first team sport
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RSSToday, sports are popular all over the world! But have you ever wondered what the first team sport was? This week, Joy and cohost Xenia learn all about the Mesoamerican Ball Game, which is more than 3,000 years old! And they meet someone who is still playing today! Plus, a game of first things first that you won’t ball-lieve!
Featured experts:
Marijke Stoll is an anthropologist who focuses on Mesoamerican Archaeology. She is an expert on the Mesoamerican ballgame.
Michael Hernandez is a Pelota Mixteca player with Pelota Mixteca Fresno.
Audio Transcript
Download transcript (PDF)
["TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALLGAME"] JOY DOLO: Sports balls. Get your sports balls, one for $2, two for $5, or five for $20!
XENIA: Hey, Joy. Are you having a yard sale?
JOY DOLO: Oh, hey, Xenia. Yeah, I cleaned out the sports wing of my closet last weekend.
XENIA: Wait. Your closet is big enough to have wings?
JOY DOLO: My closet has room for things you can't even imagine.
[LIGHTNING CRACKS]
Anyway, fancy a quick game? I've got a basketball, four softballs, six hockey pucks, definitely a few bowling balls, a football.
XENIA: Joy, that is definitely not a football.
JOY DOLO: Oh, sure it is. Go long! Double fakes left, hops right. She twirls, center. Does a split. She aims and--
XENIA: Ah, ah, ah!
JOY AND XENIA: Ah!
XENIA: The ball is alive.
JOY DOLO: Holy field hockey. That's not a football.
XENIA: Wait, Joy. That's a nine-banded armadillo. Look at its pointy ears and that long, rubbery tail and the nine stripes. They're an animal native to Mexico.
JOY DOLO: But what was it doing in the sports wing of my closet?
XENIA: It probably thought it was a good place to burrow.
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: Oh, sorry to wake you, little buddy. I'll just put her down in the grass.
[SQUEAKING]
XENIA: Here's an actual football. Go long, Joy.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: Welcome to Forever Ago, from APM Studios. I'm Joy Dolo. I'm here today with my co-host, Xenia, from San Diego, California. Hi, Xenia.
XENIA: Hi, Joy.
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: Oh, and this nine-banded armadillo that had been napping in the sports section of my closet for a mystery amount of time.
[SQUEAKING]
XENIA: Forever Ago is a non-profit public radio program.
JOY DOLO: Which means we rely on support from you, our listeners, to keep the show going.
XENIA: There's lots of ways you can support the show.
JOY DOLO: You can donate, buy our merch, or become a Smarty Pass subscriber. Head to ForeverAgo.org to show your support.
XENIA: And thank you.
JOY DOLO: Phew. It's so good to get my closet cleaned out. It was getting out of control in there. Way too many sport balls for all my sporty needs. Xenia, do you play sports?
XENIA: Yeah, I play soccer.
JOY DOLO: Oh, OK. How long have you been playing soccer?
XENIA: For four years.
JOY DOLO: Nice. What position do you play?
XENIA: I like to play a winger, so that's the outside midfielder.
JOY DOLO: Oh, cool.
XENIA: So we do a lot of running. We can score, and we can defend as well.
JOY DOLO: Defend the team. So if you could be an Olympic athlete in any sport, which would you pick?
XENIA: I think I would choose the steeplechase from track and field or swimming.
JOY DOLO: The steeplechase. Imagine I'm an alien and I have no idea what that is. Could you describe it for me?
XENIA: Yeah. I don't really know how many laps it is, but it's around the track. And there are big hurdles, and then there's one hurdle where there's water. So you jump over it, and then you splash in the water, and then you keep running. So I don't know. I've just always thought that was fun.
JOY DOLO: That looks fun. Running and water? Count me in. [LAUGHS] I can't believe how many different sports there are. Xenia, how many can you name?
XENIA: Soccer, baseball, tennis, football, swimming, ice skating.
JOY DOLO: Wow.
XENIA: Curling, track and field, rugby.
JOY DOLO: Oh, my goodness.
XENIA: I think that's all I have right now.
JOY DOLO: Oh, man, I wish I knew more. I think you took all of mine. Cricket. Cricket's a game.
XENIA: Oh, yeah.
[LAUGHTER]
JOY DOLO: You said swimming?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: You said football?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: There are lots of sports. Long story short, there are lots of sports. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: I can't name them all.
JOY DOLO: Oh, skiing. Skiing.
XENIA: Skiing.
JOY DOLO: Skiing is a sport.
XENIA: I wonder what the first sport was?
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: Seems like our armadillo friend wants to know, too. We've actually gotten some listener questions about this.
CLARA: Hi, my name is Clara, and I live in Pennsylvania. My question is, who invented sports, and what did they look like when they were invented?
EDDIE: Hi, my name is Eddie. I live in Colorado. My question is, why were sports created?
JOY DOLO: Such great questions. Thanks to Clara and Eddie for sending them in. Historians think the first sport or game that humans competed in was probably running or wrestling.
XENIA: Makes sense. You don't need any equipment to do those. But what about the first team sport?
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: It really feels like the armadillo is trying to tell us something. Come here, you little friend. Get over here.
AGUSTINA: Oh, [SPANISH]. That's Spanish for finally. [SPEAKING SPANISH]
JOY AND XENIA: Whoa.
XENIA: You can talk?
AGUSTINA: Are fresh grubs the most [SPANISH] food in the world? Yeah, I can talk.
XENIA: So, Agustina, the armadillo, do you know what the first team sport was?
AGUSTINA: I've got a pretty good guess. As you know, we armadillos are famous for our love of archaeology.
JOY DOLO: Obviously.
AGUSTINA: And in my studies, I've learned that many archaeologists think the first team sport came from the same place as me, the land that, today, is known as Mexico.
XENIA: Wait, I bet you're talking about a sport called the Mesoamerican ballgame. I've heard of this.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH] That's Spanish for "of course." the Mesoamerican ballgame has been played in Mexico, a.k.a., my home country, for thousands of years. I can tell you all about it.
JOY DOLO: Please. I must know everything about this historically important game with a very generic-sounding name.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
AGUSTINA: Well, there's a reason for the name. It's because historians actually came up with it to describe a whole bunch of games. Even though they say Mesoamerican ballgame, they're actually talking about several related games that were played on similar style courts with similar rules. These games started around the same time, in roughly the same part of the world, Mesoamerica.
XENIA: This is a region that includes parts of modern-day Mexico, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Belize.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH]. And in these different places, the games they played probably had different names and slightly different rules. But because they looked similar, people thought they were all the same game, just like how people think all armadillos are the same. But hello. Hola. We're actually 20 different species.
JOY DOLO: Oh, I get it. It's like if thousands of years from now, archaeologists came here and discovered tennis courts, pickleball courts, and ping pong tables.
XENIA: They might call them the North American paddle game.
JOY DOLO: In all three sports, people hit balls with paddles or rackets, so someone might think they're all basically the same game.
AGUSTINA: Exactly. The very oldest Mesoamerican court that we found so far was built in Southern Mexico in 1650 BC.
JOY DOLO: That's almost 3,700 years ago. A group of people called the Mokaya lived there.
XENIA: Mokaya means Corn People in their native language, because they were farmers.
AGUSTINA: Si. Thousands of years ago, the area where the Mokaya lived was covered in dense rainforest. It was a warm, wet place, and archaeologists think that this climate helped the Mokaya grow crops because plants love warm, wet weather.
JOY DOLO: Oh, and another fun fact about the Mokaya people? Archaeologists think they may have been the first people to consume chocolate.
AGUSTINA: Muy bien, amigas. Like I mentioned, the area where the Mokaya lived is also where the very first ball court was discovered, in a place called Paso de la Amada. Picture this.
[BIRD CALLING]
Paso de la Amada is a few miles away from the Pacific Ocean. The ball court discovered there was 260 long and 26 wide.
JOY DOLO: That's about 100 feet shorter than a football field.
XENIA: And much more narrow.
AGUSTINA: Along the sides were two mounds or hills with benches built into them.
XENIA: Like a stadium.
AGUSTINA: Right. Archaeologists think that the game was usually played with two teams of about five players. They would hit a hard ball back and forth.
[BALL THUDDING]
In some games, the goal was to keep it from hitting the ground. And in others, they might have tried to launch it through a small hoop mounted high in the air.
[WHOOSHING]
[CHEERING]
In some versions, players only hit the ball with their hands. And in others, it was no hands allowed, just like soccer. Except instead of kicking the ball, players would usually hit it with their hips. Sometimes, they would wear padded belts made of leather, cloth, or wood to help protect them, but not always.
XENIA: Ouch.
AGUSTINA: It wouldn't have been a problem for me. Did you know armadillo means little armored one in Spanish? These hips are hardy. [SQUEAKS]
JOY DOLO: Wait. How do archaeologists know all of this? Did they find some sort of ancient rule book?
AGUSTINA: Not quite. Remember, this was a really long time ago. Lots of history wasn't written down, so the archaeologists who study this had to be like detectives.
XENIA: Oh, yeah. Archaeologists figure out what life was like for people in the past by using anything that those people left behind.
JOY DOLO: So they can look for clues in all kinds of things, everyday objects they find, art, like paintings and pottery, even the natural world.
AGUSTINA: Si. To figure out the rules of the game, archaeologists have studied the ball courts themselves. They've read descriptions that other people eventually wrote of the games, and they've even looked at ancient artwork that shows the ballgames being played.
XENIA: Oh, yeah. I've seen little clay figurines of ballplayers from thousands of years ago.
JOY DOLO: Kind of like ancient bobbleheads. [LAUGHS]
AGUSTINA: Plus, remember how I mentioned the balls the game was played with? Well, archaeologists actually found some of those ancient balls during an archaeological dig and analyzed them in a lab. It turns out, they're made from the Castilla elastica tree.
JOY DOLO: Hold on. This calls for my handy dandy tree ID app. Castilla elastica. Castilla elastica.
[CHIMING]
Of course, the rubber tree. It grows in Mesoamerica, and ancient people there used to use its sticky sap to make rubber.
XENIA: So the ball game is played with rubber balls.
JOY DOLO: It would make sense for a game played with rubber balls to have started in a place with lots of rubber trees. [LAUGHS] Dolo shoots. Dolo scores.
[CHIMING]
Ah, I love the game of discovery. And you know what other game I love?
CHILDREN (SINGING): First thing's first.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: This is the game where we try to put three different things from history in order. In honor of my great sports ball sale, today's things are all round, snow Globes, ball pits, and marbles. What do you think, Xenia? Which came first, second, and most recently in history?
XENIA: What's a ball pit?
JOY DOLO: You know those big, plastic colored balls that are in a big pit kind of thing?
XENIA: Oh, OK. Those. Yeah.
JOY DOLO: When you jump on them, they all go all over the place. That's a ball pit. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: Marbles first, because I think those are just round, glass balls.
JOY DOLO: Yeah, yeah.
XENIA: And then snow globes because that's glass. And then you put something inside of them, and there's fake snow.
JOY DOLO: Yeah. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: And then ball pits, because the balls are plastic, I think.
JOY DOLO: Yes, yes. That makes sense. So these are material based things. We have glass first. Then we make marbles, and then we expand the marble and put snow globe stuff inside of it. And then we are on to plastic, so that's further. I think that's a great guess. So we have marbles, and then snow globes, and then ball pits?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: Awesome. I think that's great. We'll hear the answers at the end of the episode, right after the credits.
XENIA: So stick around.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: Hey, Forever Ago friends. We love hearing from our listeners. We're working on an episode all about school uniforms, and we want to hear from you. Do you think kids should wear uniforms to school? Why or why not? If you could design a school uniform for everyone in your school to wear every day, what would it look like? Xenia, what do you think? What kind of uniform would you design?
XENIA: I don't think kids should wear a uniform to school. I don't like uniforms, and I wear them. They're ugly. They have ugly colors. It's khaki and green, so I don't like it. I think if I were to design a school uniform, I think it would be blue pants and then a school shirt. Because I think I want just a loose uniform.
JOY DOLO: Do you think it's blue pants and a blue shirt, or is the shirt a different color?
XENIA: I think the shirt would be a different color, but a nice color. But I don't know what color.
JOY DOLO: But a nice color?
XENIA: Yeah, because I just don't want it to be khaki and green because I don't like those.
JOY DOLO: [LAUGHS] Those aren't fun.
XENIA: No.
JOY DOLO: Listeners, let us know what you think about school uniforms. Record yourself sharing your opinion on school uniforms or describing your dream design, and send it to us at ForeverAgo.org/Contact. Can't wait to hear from you. Thanks.
XENIA: And keep listening.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
ANNOUNCER: Brains On! Universe is a family of podcasts for kids and their adults. Since you're a fan of Forever Ago, you'll love the other shows in our universe. Come on, let's explore.
[JET ENGINE ROARS]
ALIEN: Its Alien Exercise Hour. Hi-ya, hoo, ha. While I stretch my "snoodles" and "trampolini," I'll listen to a new podcast. [LAUGHS]
[BUZZING]
I'm going to try Brains On!, the best science podcast ever.
[BEEPING]
WOMAN: It's starting. Yay.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
HOST: Hello, and welcome to Pop Planet, the only show that gets you up close and personal with space. I'm your host, Star E--
[BEEPING]
ALIEN: Zorp. Come back here, podcast. [BEEPING] Must listen to Brains On! now.
[BLASTING]
ANNOUNCER: Listen to Brains On! wherever you get your podcasts.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: You're listening to Forever Ago. I'm Joy.
XENIA: I'm Xenia.
AGUSTINA: [SPEAKING SPANISH] Agustina, the armadillo. [SQUEAKS]
JOY DOLO: Agustina has been telling us all about the Mesoamerican ballgame, which many historians believe was the first team sport.
XENIA: Before the break, we learned that this game is at least 3,700 years old. Artifacts like sculptures and pottery have helped archaeologists better understand how it was played.
JOY DOLO: Many historians believe the Mesoamerican ballgame started in Southern Mexico. That's where the oldest ball court ever discovered is.
XENIA: Plus, the game was played with rubber balls, and this area is home to rubber trees.
JOY DOLO: But no matter where the game started, we know for sure that back then, it was hugely popular with people from all walks of life.
AGUSTINA: That's right, I actually did an interview with someone about this because, as we all know, armadillos are famous for our love of informational interviews.
XENIA: Obviously.
AGUSTINA: I talked to Marijke Stoll. She's an archaeologist and an expert on the Mesoamerican ballgame.
MARIJKE STOLL: So just like today, with our modern sports, there are people who take it very seriously and invest a lot of time and money into it, a lot of training. Maybe they don't go on to being professional. Maybe they do. But if you're a professional athlete, people worship you. You're paid a lot of money. You're a celebrity.
JOY DOLO: Like Steph Curry.
XENIA: Or Trinity Rodman.
MARIJKE STOLL: But, then, there's the other side of it, where people play on the black top. They play basketball on the black top, and it's just for fun.
JOY DOLO: This makes sense. So just like sports today, people played at all different levels.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH]. And no matter what, people loved to watch. Here's Marijke again.
MARIJKE STOLL: So it was about bringing the community together. We find these clay models of ball courts and ballgames, and there are people watching. There are vendors selling food. They also show dancers and musicians. So these ballgames were also just big events.
XENIA: So cool.
AGUSTINA: Ball courts have been found all the way north, into Arizona, and east, across the sea, into the Caribbean. In other words, it spread more than a million square miles.
JOY DOLO: Do we know how it spread?
AGUSTINA: Archaeologists aren't exactly sure. Back then, people couldn't just take a video of themselves playing and upload it to "LickTok."
XENIA: "LickTok"?
AGUSTINA: Sorry, I just needed to eat a grub. [SLURPS] [SPANISH]. [SLURPS] That's my last one. Anyway, I meant to say TikTok. The people who were playing this game were moving around, especially to trade goods during this time.
JOY DOLO: Also, if the ball game is actually older than we think, it could have spread because people were nomadic back then, which means they moved around a lot.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH]. True. We know versions of the game were played by three of the most powerful empires in Central America, first, the Olmec, then the Mayas, and finally, the Aztecs.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
XENIA: These were each advanced, highly organized civilizations with beautiful ceramics and sculptures, large cities, and complex religious practices.
AGUSTINA: And the ballgame was really important to them. Archaeologists know the game was played as part of religious ceremonies and sometimes, to settle arguments with other groups.
XENIA: The Aztecs were in power when the Spanish arrived in the 1500s.
AGUSTINA: That's right. The Spanish colonized, which means they took over the Aztecs' land.
XENIA: And they tried to force them to give up their language and traditions.
JOY DOLO: Did that affect the ballgame?
AGUSTINA: It did. The Spanish banned all types of sports and games that were played by the Aztecs, but the Aztecs kept playing games in secret because it was a huge part of their identity and culture. Then, after 300 years of being ruled by the Spanish, Mexico won its independence in 1810.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: And by that time, the native civilizations were almost wiped out by disease and violence.
XENIA: But the descendants of the ballplayers kept the sport alive. And when Mexico got its independence, they could start playing openly again. I actually saw a version of the game being played once.
JOY DOLO: Oh, that's so cool. Where did you see it?
XENIA: I was in Mérida, which is in the Yucatan Peninsula. That's in Mexico. And they would hit a big, heavy rubber ball with their hips. And they passed each other, and then they tried to hit it up, into a goal. It's a hoop that's really high up. And then, at the end, they lit the ball on fire and kept playing with it like that.
JOY DOLO: Whoa.
XENIA: It was really cool.
JOY DOLO: That sounds painful. [LAUGHS] So they hit the ball with their hips, into a hoop. And then, after they did that, they set it on fire and kept hitting the ball with their hips?
XENIA: Yeah. Yeah. They passed the ball around after, and we got to feel how heavy it was. It was really heavy.
JOY DOLO: Oh, that's so neat.
AGUSTINA: People play different versions all over the world, like Pelota Mixteca. That's a version where players can use their hands to hit the ball. I talked with the player from California, named Michael Hernandez, about it. He told me that about 100 years ago, players started wearing a glove on one hand, made out of something sort of unusual.
MICHAEL HERNANDEZ: And it began just as an old huarache, an old-- what do you call them here? Sandals. And so the sandal was just old, taken apart, and they just wrapped it right here, just so that their hand wouldn't hurt as much.
AGUSTINA: But the gloves today have leveled up. Like baseball gloves, they're made of leather. But instead of being shaped like a basket to catch the ball, they look more like a small pillow with a strap you put your hand into. And get this. The outside is covered in shiny silver nailheads, which help propel the ball when you hit it. Michael showed me his son's glove, which is a beautiful [SPANISH] or a sky blue.
JOY DOLO: Wait. Michael's son plays, too? I love a family that sports together.
AGUSTINA: I know Michael's son is nine, and he's part of a long line of Pelota players.
MICHAEL HERNANDEZ: My grandfather played, his grandfather played, his father played, so it's just something that's always been handed down, generation after generation. It's something that's been handed down to us. It's part of our bloodline. Like, it's part of our culture. It's part of our inheritance.
XENIA: That's so cool.
AGUSTINA: Truly. If you want to see videos of the game being played, we put a link to Pelota Mixteca Fresno's Instagram page in the show notes.
JOY DOLO: Amazing. Hey, I actually think I've got some old sandals in the shoe wing of my closet. What do you say we try and get a game going?
XENIA: You're on.
AGUSTINA: Vamos. Let's go.
MICHAEL HERNANDEZ:
XENIA: The Mesoamerican ballgame may be the oldest team sport in the world.
JOY DOLO: It's actually a collection of similar games that have been played across parts of North and Central America and the Caribbean for over 3,000 years.
XENIA: And it's still being played in many different parts of the region today.
JOY DOLO: This episode was written by--
NICO GONZALEZ WISLER: Nico Gonzalez Wisler.
JOY DOLO: It was produced by--
RUBY GUTHRIE: Ruby Guthrie.
JOY DOLO: It was edited by--
SHAHLA FARZAN: Shahla Farzan.
JOY DOLO: Fact checking by--
ANNA GOLDFIELD: Anna Goldfield.
JOY DOLO: Engineering help from Alex Simpson and Deborah Reeves, with sound design by--
RACHEL BREES: Rachel Brees.
JOY DOLO: Original theme music by--
MARC SANCHEZ: Marc Sanchez.
JOY DOLO: We had additional production help from the rest of the Brains On! Universe team.
MOLLY BLOOM: Molly Bloom.
ROSE DUPONT: Rose DuPont.
LAUREN HUMBERT: Lauren Humbert.
JOSHUA RAY: Joshua Ray.
MARC SANCHEZ: Marc Sanchez.
SANDEN TOTTEN: Sanden Totten.
CHARLOTTE TRAVER: Charlotte Traver.
ANNA WEGGEL: Anna Weggel.
JOY DOLO: And--
ARON WOLDESLASSIE: Aron Woldeslassie.
JOY DOLO: Beth Perlman is our executive producer. And the executives in charge of APM Studios are Chandra Kavati and Joanne Griffith. Special thanks to Natalie Garcia.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
Xenia, are you ready to hear the answers for First Things First?
XENIA: You bet.
JOY DOLO: You betcha. All right, so as a reminder, we're putting these three ball-shaped things in order. And you said marbles, snow globes, and then ball pits, right?
XENIA: Yeah, I did.
JOY DOLO: All right. Well, (SINGING) let's see the answers and see what they got
Oh, my gosh. You got it right.
XENIA: I did?
JOY DOLO: You did. You were right.
XENIA: I never get them right.
JOY DOLO: [LAUGHS] Today's a special day.
XENIA: Yay!
JOY DOLO: Marble-like games have been played for thousands of years. Small clay marbles have been found in ancient Egyptian tombs, and there's evidence they were popular in ancient Greece and Rome, too. The earliest book on marbles was published in 1815, in England. This book listed marbles as being made of china, clay, glass, or even real marble, at the time. Glass marbles, which are most popular today, became common starting in the mid-1800s. So you're absolutely right with the glass technique strategy, going at it. It's interesting that they used to be made of clay, though.
XENIA: It's just different than what I'm used to.
JOY DOLO: [LAUGHS] So next up is snow globes, and those were invented in 1878. So the first documented appearance of snow globes was at an exposition in Paris in 1878. They were billed as paperweights with a man holding an umbrella. And when you flipped the ball, it looked like he was in a fake snowstorm.
XENIA: Oh, wow.
JOY DOLO: The first official patent for a snow globe was given to an inventor who was actually trying to improve a tool that would focus light during surgery. Whoa. But his snow globes were so successful that he started a snow globe company, and it's still in business today. When did they start doing Christmas ones, with the snow and stuff in it? That's all I think of, when I think of snow globes. You know?
XENIA: Yeah. Snowman. Snow. Christmas trees. That's a snow globe.
JOY DOLO: With a little polar bear in the middle.
[LAUGHTER]
Last but certainly not least is ball pits, and that was invented in 1971. So the international furniture store, IKEA, likely had the first ever ball pit. Have you been to IKEA before?
XENIA: Yeah, I feel like I have. I think so, yeah.
JOY DOLO: That furniture store?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: It opened at the children's play area, in their store, in Stockholm, Sweden in 1971. The designers were inspired when they opened a box that contained a new type of protective packing material, small plastic balls, like Styrofoam packing peanuts. And they imagined what it would be like to swim around in there. And voila, the ball pit was born. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: They had a play area?
JOY DOLO: Yeah, yeah. So the IKEA must have had an area for folks to go play around in. I mean, I guess it's also for adults, because adults can go sit on furniture, so everyone's playing.
XENIA: That's cool.
JOY DOLO: I would love to jump into a pit of those packing peanuts. Those seem so squishy and fun. Was there anything in these last three that surprised you?
XENIA: Probably the second one with the snow globe, that he was trying to invent a tool or improve a tool that they used for surgery, for the light. And then he ended up making a snow globe.
JOY DOLO: That was so wild. And there are always these happy accidents that happen sometimes, when you're trying to do something, and then you actually invent something else. So I'm going to start inventing something. I'm going to start my peanut packing ball pit.
[LAUGHTER]
We'll be back next week, with an episode all about the famous dancer and entertainer, Josephine Baker.
XENIA: Thanks for listening.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
[PERCUSSIVE MUSIC]
XENIA: Hey, Joy. Are you having a yard sale?
JOY DOLO: Oh, hey, Xenia. Yeah, I cleaned out the sports wing of my closet last weekend.
XENIA: Wait. Your closet is big enough to have wings?
JOY DOLO: My closet has room for things you can't even imagine.
[LIGHTNING CRACKS]
Anyway, fancy a quick game? I've got a basketball, four softballs, six hockey pucks, definitely a few bowling balls, a football.
XENIA: Joy, that is definitely not a football.
JOY DOLO: Oh, sure it is. Go long! Double fakes left, hops right. She twirls, center. Does a split. She aims and--
XENIA: Ah, ah, ah!
JOY AND XENIA: Ah!
XENIA: The ball is alive.
JOY DOLO: Holy field hockey. That's not a football.
XENIA: Wait, Joy. That's a nine-banded armadillo. Look at its pointy ears and that long, rubbery tail and the nine stripes. They're an animal native to Mexico.
JOY DOLO: But what was it doing in the sports wing of my closet?
XENIA: It probably thought it was a good place to burrow.
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: Oh, sorry to wake you, little buddy. I'll just put her down in the grass.
[SQUEAKING]
XENIA: Here's an actual football. Go long, Joy.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: Welcome to Forever Ago, from APM Studios. I'm Joy Dolo. I'm here today with my co-host, Xenia, from San Diego, California. Hi, Xenia.
XENIA: Hi, Joy.
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: Oh, and this nine-banded armadillo that had been napping in the sports section of my closet for a mystery amount of time.
[SQUEAKING]
XENIA: Forever Ago is a non-profit public radio program.
JOY DOLO: Which means we rely on support from you, our listeners, to keep the show going.
XENIA: There's lots of ways you can support the show.
JOY DOLO: You can donate, buy our merch, or become a Smarty Pass subscriber. Head to ForeverAgo.org to show your support.
XENIA: And thank you.
JOY DOLO: Phew. It's so good to get my closet cleaned out. It was getting out of control in there. Way too many sport balls for all my sporty needs. Xenia, do you play sports?
XENIA: Yeah, I play soccer.
JOY DOLO: Oh, OK. How long have you been playing soccer?
XENIA: For four years.
JOY DOLO: Nice. What position do you play?
XENIA: I like to play a winger, so that's the outside midfielder.
JOY DOLO: Oh, cool.
XENIA: So we do a lot of running. We can score, and we can defend as well.
JOY DOLO: Defend the team. So if you could be an Olympic athlete in any sport, which would you pick?
XENIA: I think I would choose the steeplechase from track and field or swimming.
JOY DOLO: The steeplechase. Imagine I'm an alien and I have no idea what that is. Could you describe it for me?
XENIA: Yeah. I don't really know how many laps it is, but it's around the track. And there are big hurdles, and then there's one hurdle where there's water. So you jump over it, and then you splash in the water, and then you keep running. So I don't know. I've just always thought that was fun.
JOY DOLO: That looks fun. Running and water? Count me in. [LAUGHS] I can't believe how many different sports there are. Xenia, how many can you name?
XENIA: Soccer, baseball, tennis, football, swimming, ice skating.
JOY DOLO: Wow.
XENIA: Curling, track and field, rugby.
JOY DOLO: Oh, my goodness.
XENIA: I think that's all I have right now.
JOY DOLO: Oh, man, I wish I knew more. I think you took all of mine. Cricket. Cricket's a game.
XENIA: Oh, yeah.
[LAUGHTER]
JOY DOLO: You said swimming?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: You said football?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: There are lots of sports. Long story short, there are lots of sports. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: I can't name them all.
JOY DOLO: Oh, skiing. Skiing.
XENIA: Skiing.
JOY DOLO: Skiing is a sport.
XENIA: I wonder what the first sport was?
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: Seems like our armadillo friend wants to know, too. We've actually gotten some listener questions about this.
CLARA: Hi, my name is Clara, and I live in Pennsylvania. My question is, who invented sports, and what did they look like when they were invented?
EDDIE: Hi, my name is Eddie. I live in Colorado. My question is, why were sports created?
JOY DOLO: Such great questions. Thanks to Clara and Eddie for sending them in. Historians think the first sport or game that humans competed in was probably running or wrestling.
XENIA: Makes sense. You don't need any equipment to do those. But what about the first team sport?
[SQUEAKING]
JOY DOLO: It really feels like the armadillo is trying to tell us something. Come here, you little friend. Get over here.
AGUSTINA: Oh, [SPANISH]. That's Spanish for finally. [SPEAKING SPANISH]
JOY AND XENIA: Whoa.
XENIA: You can talk?
AGUSTINA: Are fresh grubs the most [SPANISH] food in the world? Yeah, I can talk.
XENIA: So, Agustina, the armadillo, do you know what the first team sport was?
AGUSTINA: I've got a pretty good guess. As you know, we armadillos are famous for our love of archaeology.
JOY DOLO: Obviously.
AGUSTINA: And in my studies, I've learned that many archaeologists think the first team sport came from the same place as me, the land that, today, is known as Mexico.
XENIA: Wait, I bet you're talking about a sport called the Mesoamerican ballgame. I've heard of this.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH] That's Spanish for "of course." the Mesoamerican ballgame has been played in Mexico, a.k.a., my home country, for thousands of years. I can tell you all about it.
JOY DOLO: Please. I must know everything about this historically important game with a very generic-sounding name.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
AGUSTINA: Well, there's a reason for the name. It's because historians actually came up with it to describe a whole bunch of games. Even though they say Mesoamerican ballgame, they're actually talking about several related games that were played on similar style courts with similar rules. These games started around the same time, in roughly the same part of the world, Mesoamerica.
XENIA: This is a region that includes parts of modern-day Mexico, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Belize.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH]. And in these different places, the games they played probably had different names and slightly different rules. But because they looked similar, people thought they were all the same game, just like how people think all armadillos are the same. But hello. Hola. We're actually 20 different species.
JOY DOLO: Oh, I get it. It's like if thousands of years from now, archaeologists came here and discovered tennis courts, pickleball courts, and ping pong tables.
XENIA: They might call them the North American paddle game.
JOY DOLO: In all three sports, people hit balls with paddles or rackets, so someone might think they're all basically the same game.
AGUSTINA: Exactly. The very oldest Mesoamerican court that we found so far was built in Southern Mexico in 1650 BC.
JOY DOLO: That's almost 3,700 years ago. A group of people called the Mokaya lived there.
XENIA: Mokaya means Corn People in their native language, because they were farmers.
AGUSTINA: Si. Thousands of years ago, the area where the Mokaya lived was covered in dense rainforest. It was a warm, wet place, and archaeologists think that this climate helped the Mokaya grow crops because plants love warm, wet weather.
JOY DOLO: Oh, and another fun fact about the Mokaya people? Archaeologists think they may have been the first people to consume chocolate.
AGUSTINA: Muy bien, amigas. Like I mentioned, the area where the Mokaya lived is also where the very first ball court was discovered, in a place called Paso de la Amada. Picture this.
[BIRD CALLING]
Paso de la Amada is a few miles away from the Pacific Ocean. The ball court discovered there was 260 long and 26 wide.
JOY DOLO: That's about 100 feet shorter than a football field.
XENIA: And much more narrow.
AGUSTINA: Along the sides were two mounds or hills with benches built into them.
XENIA: Like a stadium.
AGUSTINA: Right. Archaeologists think that the game was usually played with two teams of about five players. They would hit a hard ball back and forth.
[BALL THUDDING]
In some games, the goal was to keep it from hitting the ground. And in others, they might have tried to launch it through a small hoop mounted high in the air.
[WHOOSHING]
[CHEERING]
In some versions, players only hit the ball with their hands. And in others, it was no hands allowed, just like soccer. Except instead of kicking the ball, players would usually hit it with their hips. Sometimes, they would wear padded belts made of leather, cloth, or wood to help protect them, but not always.
XENIA: Ouch.
AGUSTINA: It wouldn't have been a problem for me. Did you know armadillo means little armored one in Spanish? These hips are hardy. [SQUEAKS]
JOY DOLO: Wait. How do archaeologists know all of this? Did they find some sort of ancient rule book?
AGUSTINA: Not quite. Remember, this was a really long time ago. Lots of history wasn't written down, so the archaeologists who study this had to be like detectives.
XENIA: Oh, yeah. Archaeologists figure out what life was like for people in the past by using anything that those people left behind.
JOY DOLO: So they can look for clues in all kinds of things, everyday objects they find, art, like paintings and pottery, even the natural world.
AGUSTINA: Si. To figure out the rules of the game, archaeologists have studied the ball courts themselves. They've read descriptions that other people eventually wrote of the games, and they've even looked at ancient artwork that shows the ballgames being played.
XENIA: Oh, yeah. I've seen little clay figurines of ballplayers from thousands of years ago.
JOY DOLO: Kind of like ancient bobbleheads. [LAUGHS]
AGUSTINA: Plus, remember how I mentioned the balls the game was played with? Well, archaeologists actually found some of those ancient balls during an archaeological dig and analyzed them in a lab. It turns out, they're made from the Castilla elastica tree.
JOY DOLO: Hold on. This calls for my handy dandy tree ID app. Castilla elastica. Castilla elastica.
[CHIMING]
Of course, the rubber tree. It grows in Mesoamerica, and ancient people there used to use its sticky sap to make rubber.
XENIA: So the ball game is played with rubber balls.
JOY DOLO: It would make sense for a game played with rubber balls to have started in a place with lots of rubber trees. [LAUGHS] Dolo shoots. Dolo scores.
[CHIMING]
Ah, I love the game of discovery. And you know what other game I love?
CHILDREN (SINGING): First thing's first.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: This is the game where we try to put three different things from history in order. In honor of my great sports ball sale, today's things are all round, snow Globes, ball pits, and marbles. What do you think, Xenia? Which came first, second, and most recently in history?
XENIA: What's a ball pit?
JOY DOLO: You know those big, plastic colored balls that are in a big pit kind of thing?
XENIA: Oh, OK. Those. Yeah.
JOY DOLO: When you jump on them, they all go all over the place. That's a ball pit. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: Marbles first, because I think those are just round, glass balls.
JOY DOLO: Yeah, yeah.
XENIA: And then snow globes because that's glass. And then you put something inside of them, and there's fake snow.
JOY DOLO: Yeah. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: And then ball pits, because the balls are plastic, I think.
JOY DOLO: Yes, yes. That makes sense. So these are material based things. We have glass first. Then we make marbles, and then we expand the marble and put snow globe stuff inside of it. And then we are on to plastic, so that's further. I think that's a great guess. So we have marbles, and then snow globes, and then ball pits?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: Awesome. I think that's great. We'll hear the answers at the end of the episode, right after the credits.
XENIA: So stick around.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: Hey, Forever Ago friends. We love hearing from our listeners. We're working on an episode all about school uniforms, and we want to hear from you. Do you think kids should wear uniforms to school? Why or why not? If you could design a school uniform for everyone in your school to wear every day, what would it look like? Xenia, what do you think? What kind of uniform would you design?
XENIA: I don't think kids should wear a uniform to school. I don't like uniforms, and I wear them. They're ugly. They have ugly colors. It's khaki and green, so I don't like it. I think if I were to design a school uniform, I think it would be blue pants and then a school shirt. Because I think I want just a loose uniform.
JOY DOLO: Do you think it's blue pants and a blue shirt, or is the shirt a different color?
XENIA: I think the shirt would be a different color, but a nice color. But I don't know what color.
JOY DOLO: But a nice color?
XENIA: Yeah, because I just don't want it to be khaki and green because I don't like those.
JOY DOLO: [LAUGHS] Those aren't fun.
XENIA: No.
JOY DOLO: Listeners, let us know what you think about school uniforms. Record yourself sharing your opinion on school uniforms or describing your dream design, and send it to us at ForeverAgo.org/Contact. Can't wait to hear from you. Thanks.
XENIA: And keep listening.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
ANNOUNCER: Brains On! Universe is a family of podcasts for kids and their adults. Since you're a fan of Forever Ago, you'll love the other shows in our universe. Come on, let's explore.
[JET ENGINE ROARS]
ALIEN: Its Alien Exercise Hour. Hi-ya, hoo, ha. While I stretch my "snoodles" and "trampolini," I'll listen to a new podcast. [LAUGHS]
[BUZZING]
I'm going to try Brains On!, the best science podcast ever.
[BEEPING]
WOMAN: It's starting. Yay.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
HOST: Hello, and welcome to Pop Planet, the only show that gets you up close and personal with space. I'm your host, Star E--
[BEEPING]
ALIEN: Zorp. Come back here, podcast. [BEEPING] Must listen to Brains On! now.
[BLASTING]
ANNOUNCER: Listen to Brains On! wherever you get your podcasts.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: You're listening to Forever Ago. I'm Joy.
XENIA: I'm Xenia.
AGUSTINA: [SPEAKING SPANISH] Agustina, the armadillo. [SQUEAKS]
JOY DOLO: Agustina has been telling us all about the Mesoamerican ballgame, which many historians believe was the first team sport.
XENIA: Before the break, we learned that this game is at least 3,700 years old. Artifacts like sculptures and pottery have helped archaeologists better understand how it was played.
JOY DOLO: Many historians believe the Mesoamerican ballgame started in Southern Mexico. That's where the oldest ball court ever discovered is.
XENIA: Plus, the game was played with rubber balls, and this area is home to rubber trees.
JOY DOLO: But no matter where the game started, we know for sure that back then, it was hugely popular with people from all walks of life.
AGUSTINA: That's right, I actually did an interview with someone about this because, as we all know, armadillos are famous for our love of informational interviews.
XENIA: Obviously.
AGUSTINA: I talked to Marijke Stoll. She's an archaeologist and an expert on the Mesoamerican ballgame.
MARIJKE STOLL: So just like today, with our modern sports, there are people who take it very seriously and invest a lot of time and money into it, a lot of training. Maybe they don't go on to being professional. Maybe they do. But if you're a professional athlete, people worship you. You're paid a lot of money. You're a celebrity.
JOY DOLO: Like Steph Curry.
XENIA: Or Trinity Rodman.
MARIJKE STOLL: But, then, there's the other side of it, where people play on the black top. They play basketball on the black top, and it's just for fun.
JOY DOLO: This makes sense. So just like sports today, people played at all different levels.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH]. And no matter what, people loved to watch. Here's Marijke again.
MARIJKE STOLL: So it was about bringing the community together. We find these clay models of ball courts and ballgames, and there are people watching. There are vendors selling food. They also show dancers and musicians. So these ballgames were also just big events.
XENIA: So cool.
AGUSTINA: Ball courts have been found all the way north, into Arizona, and east, across the sea, into the Caribbean. In other words, it spread more than a million square miles.
JOY DOLO: Do we know how it spread?
AGUSTINA: Archaeologists aren't exactly sure. Back then, people couldn't just take a video of themselves playing and upload it to "LickTok."
XENIA: "LickTok"?
AGUSTINA: Sorry, I just needed to eat a grub. [SLURPS] [SPANISH]. [SLURPS] That's my last one. Anyway, I meant to say TikTok. The people who were playing this game were moving around, especially to trade goods during this time.
JOY DOLO: Also, if the ball game is actually older than we think, it could have spread because people were nomadic back then, which means they moved around a lot.
AGUSTINA: [SPANISH]. True. We know versions of the game were played by three of the most powerful empires in Central America, first, the Olmec, then the Mayas, and finally, the Aztecs.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
XENIA: These were each advanced, highly organized civilizations with beautiful ceramics and sculptures, large cities, and complex religious practices.
AGUSTINA: And the ballgame was really important to them. Archaeologists know the game was played as part of religious ceremonies and sometimes, to settle arguments with other groups.
XENIA: The Aztecs were in power when the Spanish arrived in the 1500s.
AGUSTINA: That's right. The Spanish colonized, which means they took over the Aztecs' land.
XENIA: And they tried to force them to give up their language and traditions.
JOY DOLO: Did that affect the ballgame?
AGUSTINA: It did. The Spanish banned all types of sports and games that were played by the Aztecs, but the Aztecs kept playing games in secret because it was a huge part of their identity and culture. Then, after 300 years of being ruled by the Spanish, Mexico won its independence in 1810.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
JOY DOLO: And by that time, the native civilizations were almost wiped out by disease and violence.
XENIA: But the descendants of the ballplayers kept the sport alive. And when Mexico got its independence, they could start playing openly again. I actually saw a version of the game being played once.
JOY DOLO: Oh, that's so cool. Where did you see it?
XENIA: I was in Mérida, which is in the Yucatan Peninsula. That's in Mexico. And they would hit a big, heavy rubber ball with their hips. And they passed each other, and then they tried to hit it up, into a goal. It's a hoop that's really high up. And then, at the end, they lit the ball on fire and kept playing with it like that.
JOY DOLO: Whoa.
XENIA: It was really cool.
JOY DOLO: That sounds painful. [LAUGHS] So they hit the ball with their hips, into a hoop. And then, after they did that, they set it on fire and kept hitting the ball with their hips?
XENIA: Yeah. Yeah. They passed the ball around after, and we got to feel how heavy it was. It was really heavy.
JOY DOLO: Oh, that's so neat.
AGUSTINA: People play different versions all over the world, like Pelota Mixteca. That's a version where players can use their hands to hit the ball. I talked with the player from California, named Michael Hernandez, about it. He told me that about 100 years ago, players started wearing a glove on one hand, made out of something sort of unusual.
MICHAEL HERNANDEZ: And it began just as an old huarache, an old-- what do you call them here? Sandals. And so the sandal was just old, taken apart, and they just wrapped it right here, just so that their hand wouldn't hurt as much.
AGUSTINA: But the gloves today have leveled up. Like baseball gloves, they're made of leather. But instead of being shaped like a basket to catch the ball, they look more like a small pillow with a strap you put your hand into. And get this. The outside is covered in shiny silver nailheads, which help propel the ball when you hit it. Michael showed me his son's glove, which is a beautiful [SPANISH] or a sky blue.
JOY DOLO: Wait. Michael's son plays, too? I love a family that sports together.
AGUSTINA: I know Michael's son is nine, and he's part of a long line of Pelota players.
MICHAEL HERNANDEZ: My grandfather played, his grandfather played, his father played, so it's just something that's always been handed down, generation after generation. It's something that's been handed down to us. It's part of our bloodline. Like, it's part of our culture. It's part of our inheritance.
XENIA: That's so cool.
AGUSTINA: Truly. If you want to see videos of the game being played, we put a link to Pelota Mixteca Fresno's Instagram page in the show notes.
JOY DOLO: Amazing. Hey, I actually think I've got some old sandals in the shoe wing of my closet. What do you say we try and get a game going?
XENIA: You're on.
AGUSTINA: Vamos. Let's go.
MICHAEL HERNANDEZ:
XENIA: The Mesoamerican ballgame may be the oldest team sport in the world.
JOY DOLO: It's actually a collection of similar games that have been played across parts of North and Central America and the Caribbean for over 3,000 years.
XENIA: And it's still being played in many different parts of the region today.
JOY DOLO: This episode was written by--
NICO GONZALEZ WISLER: Nico Gonzalez Wisler.
JOY DOLO: It was produced by--
RUBY GUTHRIE: Ruby Guthrie.
JOY DOLO: It was edited by--
SHAHLA FARZAN: Shahla Farzan.
JOY DOLO: Fact checking by--
ANNA GOLDFIELD: Anna Goldfield.
JOY DOLO: Engineering help from Alex Simpson and Deborah Reeves, with sound design by--
RACHEL BREES: Rachel Brees.
JOY DOLO: Original theme music by--
MARC SANCHEZ: Marc Sanchez.
JOY DOLO: We had additional production help from the rest of the Brains On! Universe team.
MOLLY BLOOM: Molly Bloom.
ROSE DUPONT: Rose DuPont.
LAUREN HUMBERT: Lauren Humbert.
JOSHUA RAY: Joshua Ray.
MARC SANCHEZ: Marc Sanchez.
SANDEN TOTTEN: Sanden Totten.
CHARLOTTE TRAVER: Charlotte Traver.
ANNA WEGGEL: Anna Weggel.
JOY DOLO: And--
ARON WOLDESLASSIE: Aron Woldeslassie.
JOY DOLO: Beth Perlman is our executive producer. And the executives in charge of APM Studios are Chandra Kavati and Joanne Griffith. Special thanks to Natalie Garcia.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
Xenia, are you ready to hear the answers for First Things First?
XENIA: You bet.
JOY DOLO: You betcha. All right, so as a reminder, we're putting these three ball-shaped things in order. And you said marbles, snow globes, and then ball pits, right?
XENIA: Yeah, I did.
JOY DOLO: All right. Well, (SINGING) let's see the answers and see what they got
Oh, my gosh. You got it right.
XENIA: I did?
JOY DOLO: You did. You were right.
XENIA: I never get them right.
JOY DOLO: [LAUGHS] Today's a special day.
XENIA: Yay!
JOY DOLO: Marble-like games have been played for thousands of years. Small clay marbles have been found in ancient Egyptian tombs, and there's evidence they were popular in ancient Greece and Rome, too. The earliest book on marbles was published in 1815, in England. This book listed marbles as being made of china, clay, glass, or even real marble, at the time. Glass marbles, which are most popular today, became common starting in the mid-1800s. So you're absolutely right with the glass technique strategy, going at it. It's interesting that they used to be made of clay, though.
XENIA: It's just different than what I'm used to.
JOY DOLO: [LAUGHS] So next up is snow globes, and those were invented in 1878. So the first documented appearance of snow globes was at an exposition in Paris in 1878. They were billed as paperweights with a man holding an umbrella. And when you flipped the ball, it looked like he was in a fake snowstorm.
XENIA: Oh, wow.
JOY DOLO: The first official patent for a snow globe was given to an inventor who was actually trying to improve a tool that would focus light during surgery. Whoa. But his snow globes were so successful that he started a snow globe company, and it's still in business today. When did they start doing Christmas ones, with the snow and stuff in it? That's all I think of, when I think of snow globes. You know?
XENIA: Yeah. Snowman. Snow. Christmas trees. That's a snow globe.
JOY DOLO: With a little polar bear in the middle.
[LAUGHTER]
Last but certainly not least is ball pits, and that was invented in 1971. So the international furniture store, IKEA, likely had the first ever ball pit. Have you been to IKEA before?
XENIA: Yeah, I feel like I have. I think so, yeah.
JOY DOLO: That furniture store?
XENIA: Yeah.
JOY DOLO: It opened at the children's play area, in their store, in Stockholm, Sweden in 1971. The designers were inspired when they opened a box that contained a new type of protective packing material, small plastic balls, like Styrofoam packing peanuts. And they imagined what it would be like to swim around in there. And voila, the ball pit was born. [LAUGHS]
XENIA: They had a play area?
JOY DOLO: Yeah, yeah. So the IKEA must have had an area for folks to go play around in. I mean, I guess it's also for adults, because adults can go sit on furniture, so everyone's playing.
XENIA: That's cool.
JOY DOLO: I would love to jump into a pit of those packing peanuts. Those seem so squishy and fun. Was there anything in these last three that surprised you?
XENIA: Probably the second one with the snow globe, that he was trying to invent a tool or improve a tool that they used for surgery, for the light. And then he ended up making a snow globe.
JOY DOLO: That was so wild. And there are always these happy accidents that happen sometimes, when you're trying to do something, and then you actually invent something else. So I'm going to start inventing something. I'm going to start my peanut packing ball pit.
[LAUGHTER]
We'll be back next week, with an episode all about the famous dancer and entertainer, Josephine Baker.
XENIA: Thanks for listening.
[UPBEAT MUSIC]
[PERCUSSIVE MUSIC]
Transcription services provided by 3Play Media.
