ANNOUNCEMENT
Southwest Athletic Conference Records, Papers and Photographs
Now Available
Additional materials of the Southwest Conference are now available to researchers at the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library at Texas Tech University. After a year of processing, the manuscript staff of the Southwest Collection finished processing the 318 boxes of manuscript materials that detail the history and evolution of the Southwest Conference. These materials were collected in April, June, and July of 1996 from the office of the Southwest Athletic Conference, processed in 1997, and are now housed in the new $9 million Special Collections Library. They represent the fourth largest manuscript collection in the Southwest Collection’s holdings.
The manuscript records contain correspondence, memorandums, financial material, legal material, printed material, game and player statistics, and memorabilia. Of the printed material, the Collection contains media guides, game programs, and record books from each of the member universities. The Collection is organized by series that include the following headings: Administrative Committee for Women Sports, Agenda and Meeting Information, Assistant Commissioner’s Files, Associate Commissioner’s Files, Baseball, Basketball, Basketball Tournament, Bo Carter’s Files, Championships, Championships (Coley Chambles), Compliance, Compliance (Coley Chambles), Commissioner/Assistant Commissioner’s Files, Conference Operations, Football, Kyle Kallander’s Files, Legal Material, Marketing, Mickey Holmes’ Files, Research Files, Wendell Shelton’s Files, Tennis, Volleyball, Financial Material, Media Guides, Media Relations, and Memorabilia.
In addition to the manuscripts, we also have available seven boxes of photographs which consists of slides, prints, contact sheets, and negatives of various athletic personalities and events of the Southwest Conference. Most photographs date from the 1970-1996 era. Some go back to the 1950’s. These materials are available to the public in the Holden Reading Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library. Finding aids are available at the reference desk for the photographs and manuscript collections. These collections complement the videos, microfilms, oversize materials, and sound recordings which were released in the Summer of 1997.
Two additional and complementary collections were created from the records of the Southwest Conference: the NCAA Collection and the Non-Southwest Conference Collection. The NCAA Collection consist of general publications from the NCAA organization distributed to the various athletics conferences. These include manuals and record books for football, baseball, basketball, volleyball, track and field, and tennis and spans the 1939 to 1997 era. The Non-Southwest Conference Collection contains only media guides from other athletic conferences other than the SWC. This is not a complete set but signify an excellent sample of the media guides published by other schools and conferences throughout the U.S. Both collections are important sources of background information to national intercollegiate sports trends.
All of these materials provide an incredible record of athletic history in the twentieth century and serve as an invaluable reference for scholars interested in the development and history of college sports. The Conference records date from 1914-1996 and they cover every athletic program from football, men’s and women’s basketball, golf, baseball, softball, swimming and diving, volleyball, and track and field, and covers issues such as the rise of women’s athletics, rules violations, and officiating. Overall, the Southwest Athletic Conference records represent a unique collection with the history, glory and spirit of athleticism written on their pages. For more information please contact the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library at 742-3749 and ask for the Reference Desk.