Ping-pong started as a friendly game, which was played for fun. No one knows who invented it. One story is that it started when two students at Cambridge University began knocking a cork to each other across a table, using old cigar-boxes.

In about the year 1800 an American manufacturer of sports goods produced a game which was called Indoor Tennis. The Americans did not find it interesting at the time, so he exported it to his London agents and it became very popular in Britain. The game was then played across dining-room tables, or on the floor with the net strung between chairs. The players used a ball made of cork or rubber, which was covered with a net of soft string to prevent it from damaging the furniture. The bats were covered with sandpaper. A few years later a hollow ball like the one we use today was invented. The game then quickly spread all over the world.

A man called Mr. Wood, of London, had the idea of covering the bats with studded rubber to give greater control over the ball. The London agents who first sold the game in England now called it "ping-pong". "Ping" was meant to be the sound of the bat hitting the ball, and "pong" was the sound of the ball hitting the table.

Many people, however, began to play the game seriously. Its official name was changed to table-tennis, because the name "ping-pong" belonged to the London agents who first sold the equipment.

In 1926 the International Table-tennis Federation was set up. That same year a European Championship was played in London.

You may like to know the official measurements. The table is nine feet long, five feet wide and thirty inches high. The net is six feet long and six inches high. The weight of the ball is 2.4-2.5 grams.