David Booth, founder and co-CEO of Dimensional Fund Advisors, is now the owner of James Naismith's 13 rules of basketball. Booth purchased the rules for $4.3 million at a Sotheby's auction earlier this month, according to media reports.

David Booth Dimensional Fund Advisors Chairman and Co-CEO

The amount is the highest ever paid for an article of sports memorabilia.

"I was hoping to get them for a half-mil," he joked to the Kansas City Star.

So what does Booth plan to do with the rules?

"They should be displayed at Kansas," he told the pub. Growing up, Booth lived on Naismith Drive, studied at Lawrence High and went on to obtain bachelor's and master's degrees from University of Kansas.

As any basketball aficionado would know, Naismith taught at Kansas. Naismith invented the game in 1891 and died in Lawrence in 1939.

"If Kansas comes up with a suitable venue and can convince us they'll properly maintain the document, we'll give it to them," Booth said.

See coverage from The New York Times, the Chicago Sun-Times and BBC. 

Edited by: Armie Margaret Lee


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