While a game like volleyball may
 have been played back in the
 middle ages, it was invented in its
 present form in a YMCA in
 Massachusetts in 1895 as a
 diversion for middle-aged
 businessmen who found
 basketball too strenuous. 
 Missionaries brought the game to
 Asia and Russia and American
 servicemen introduced it to Europe
 during World War I.  

Volleyball is a game with simple
 rules which requires very little
 equipment and therefore it caught
 on quickly in most places in the
 world -- Asia, Latin America,
 Eastern Europe.  Only Western
 Europe was slow to embrace the
 game.  Both men's and women's
 volleyball was introduced at the
 1964 Olympics.  Games are
 played before wildly enthusiastic
 crowds.  

The U.S. men's team won
 back-to-back Gold Medals, in 1984
 and 1988, and the American
 women won the Silver at the 1984
 Olympics.  In 1992, Cuban women
 and Brazilian men brought home
 the Gold.