Last week, much of Texas—and especially the Austin-area—was iced over after winter storm Mara made its way across the state. As a result, The University of Texas campus was closed Tuesday through Thursday as roads were covered in as much as a solid inch of ice; trees and other above-ground appendages wilted and snapped under the weight of their icy burdens, creating headaches and even severe danger for many members of our local community. I’m very thankful that The Stark Center made it through unscathed, but we have not always been so lucky. The last time central Texas was struck...

With the new year approaching, it’s time to mark your calendars for the 2023 Physical Cultures of the Body Conference (PCBC) on Friday, January 13th. This will be the third iteration of this international conference, and it is free and open to all on Zoom. PCBC is jointly sponsored by the H.J. Lutcher Stark Center for Physical Culture and Sports and the academic journal Iron Game History: The Journal of Physical Culture. The conference was created as a showcase on scholarship related to historical and humanities-based approaches to the study of physical culture. We have been inspired by the international...

As many of you may remember, the winter storm in February 2021 caused an immense amount of damage here on The Forty Acres, our colloquial name for the University of Texas campus. The Stark Center, specifically, was a victim of flooding due to burst pipes on the floor above us in the North End Zone building. Jan Todd wrote about the water and the detriments to our beloved floor on her It’s A Good Life blog, which you can read by clicking here. Assessing the damage and determining an adequate solution to the issues has been a long and complicated...

As some of you may already know, The Stark Center serves as the official repository for the preservation of the UT Athletics’ archives, in addition to housing one of world’s most important libraries related to health, fitness and physical culture. The Stark Center’s holding related to UT sports includes more than 300 boxes of materials from the UT Athletics Media Relations Archives as well as personal papers and memorabilia from Longhorn coaching greats Jody Conradt, Augie Garrido, Clyde Littlefield, Mack Brown, Harvey Penick, Pat Weiss, David Snyder, Wilmer Allison and many individual former athletes. If you’ve visited The Stark Center recently, you...