I’m on vacation and hence a bit sluggish but I do have something I’ve been thinking about recently. I noticed a long time ago that there was once (and for quite some time) an entity called the “Rice Athletic Association.” It seems to have been the banner under which our internal athletic operations were organized and run but even now I’m not sure exactly how it all worked. (This is almost certainly an answerable question given the rich collection of athletic department records we have but I’ve never had the time to run it down.)
You can see evidence of this Rice AA in all kinds of photos. Here’s just one, a 1950 shot of Jess Neely in a sweatshirt:
One of those sweatshirt actually turned up a while ago, in George Miner’s collection:
But the thing that really caught my attention was this image of the 1955 Mile Relay team (with Coach Emmett Brunson) I found while I was looking at track stuff a couple of weeks ago:
Zoom in. Look at their socks.
I still don’t have time for this but when I get back next week I’ll try to make time.
Bonus: I took a U of H architecture student on a tour of Lovett Hall last week. It was great.
Extra Bonus: It was also the first time I ever saw anyone get out of this elevator! That’s Mr. Ray Jones, from IT support. (If you want to know how much the elevator cost when it was installed in 1937, go here.)
