Sports Information

An Inventory of Its Records, 1938-2009, at the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library

Biographical Sketch

This collection contains records from several athletics departments at Texas Tech University. The manuscript portion of the collection is divided up into several series: Baseball (1985-2009), Gerald Myers (1976-1991), Polk Robison (1957-1970), and Women's Intercollegiate Athletics (1973-2009).

Baseball started at Texas Tech in 1926, yet only lasted until 1929. It was brought back as an official sport in 1954. Texas Tech began construction on a new stadium in the mid-1980s after a storm wrecked much of the baseball field. In 1988 the baseball stadium, formerly called the Tech Diamond, was renamed after Dan Law, who donated the money necessary to provide lighting for nighttime games.

Gerald Myers, a native of Borger, Texas, played basketball at Tech from 1956-1959. He served as the Men’s basketball coach from 1971-1991 with a 326-261 record. Myers was named Athletic Director at Texas Tech in 1997. Before coming to Tech, he coached at Monterey High School in Lubbock and at Houston Baptist College.

Polk Robison served as Assistant Athletic Director from 1956-1961 and Athletic Director from 1961-1970. While athletic director, he served a term as chairman of the NCAA basketball committee. Robison started working at Tech in 1941 as an assistant football and basketball coach. He became head basketball coach in 1942 and continued coaching until 1961. He coached the Red Raider basketball team to their first Southwest Conference Championship in 1961.

Born in May 1912 in Springfield, Tennessee, Robison later moved to Ranger, Texas and then to Lubbock. He attended Texas Technological College in the early 1930’s, graduating in 1934.

In January 1975 Texas Tech University established the Women’s Athletic Department and appointed Jeannine McHaney as Athletic Director. Prior to the creation of the Women’s Athletic Department, women’s sports were funded and administered by Women’s Intramurals, through which Tech women had been competing in sports ten to twelve years before the official creation of the Department. Intramural sports at Tech offered nine sports, including bowling, gymnastics and badminton; however, after reorganizing under the Women’s Athletic Department, these three sports were dropped in order to cater to Texas high school athletes.

The first six sports sponsored under the Women’s Athletic Department included basketball, volleyball, tennis, swimming and diving, track and field, and golf. In 1980 softball was included; however, due to budget constraints softball was removed in 1985 along with Tech’s swimming and diving program. (Softball was again added to the program in 1996, following the addition of women’s soccer in 1994.)

The Women’s Athletics Department was originally housed in the old Naval Reserve Building. As late as August of 1975, women’s athletics owned no office equipment, no office machines, no sports equipment, and only a base amount of uniforms and warm up suits with which to outfit the six teams. The budget for men’s athletics in 1976 was $1.4 million, however, the women’s budget totaled only $145,000 (up from $10,000 the previous year).

A leader in the establishment of women's athletics at Texas Tech, McHaney started as a professor of Physical Education at Tech in 1966. She subsequently directed women's intramurals, served as TTU women's volleyball coach from 1966-1975, and was the first director of the Tech Women's Athletic Department starting in 1975. When the Women’s Athletic Department combined with the Men’s Athletic Department in the late 1980’s, McHaney was named Assistant Athletic Director. McHaney became the first woman inducted into the Texas Tech Athletic Hall of Honor. She died after losing her battle with cancer in 1994.

Scope and Content

This collection consists of files generated by several Athletic Departments at Texas Tech. The files include materials on the Double T Connection, the Southwest Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (SWAIAW), Title IX, NCAA, Southwest Conference, Jeannine McHaney, Gerald Myers, Polk Robison, and individual sport information.

Included are artifacts such as autographed footballs, Lady Raider player cards, a model of the United Spirit Arena, a trunk with a Texas Tech Matador decal, as well as several oversized posters and framed images. This collection contains 51 prints, 49 slides and nine framed images.

Restrictions

Access Restrictions

Open for research

Related Material

Administrative Information

Preferred Citation

Sports Information Collection, 1938-2009, Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas

Acquisition

Collection accession #(s):
2009-0045-B

Gift, 2009

Processed by

Denise Rojas, Anup Tavkar, and Katie Long, December 2009

Collection Inventory