Hickok's Own Trivia

The Birth of March Madness

"March Madness" means the NCAA basketball tournament to almost everyone these days.

Yet the phrase was originally applied to the Illinois high school tournament, and it literally belongs to the Illinois High School Athletic Association (IHSAA).

It first appeared as the title of an essay in the March 1939 issue of the association's magazine, Illinois High School Athlete. The journal's editor, Henry V. Porter wrote the essay.

Porter had been a teacher and coach at Athens High School in central Illinois, and he'd coached the boys' basketball team to a second-place finish in the 1924 tournament. From 1929 to 1940 he served as assistant executive secretary of the Illinois High School Athletic Association and from 1940 to 1958 he was executive secretary of the National Federation of State High School Associations.

In 1977, Jim Enright was commissioned to write a history of the Illinois tournaments. The title of the book was March Madness: The Story of High School Basketball in Illinois.

The Illinois High School Athletic Association has trademarked the phrase "March Madness" as well as "America's Original March Madness."