Russell Rice Collection on UK Sports Now Online on ExploreUK
LEXINGTON, Ky. (June 2, 2015) — University of Kentucky sports enthusiasts and researchers alike can now find a wealth of archival materials online from the Russell Rice Collection at the UK Special Collections Research Center. The large collection of sports-related materials, which largely focus on UK basketball and football but also includes other campus sports, is available to the public through ExploreUK, a digital library. Rice, who died at 90 years old on May 29, was a former sports information director and assistant athletic director of UK Athletics.
The Russell Rice Collection is more than 10 cubic feet and includes 30 boxes of materials, including photographs, audiotapes, letters, speeches, newspaper clippings and video tapes. There is extensive coverage of UK Basketball Coach Adolph Rupp, specifically in the areas of correspondence and photographic materials, as well as correspondence related to the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Rice was the sports information director for UK Athletics from 1968 to 1987 and later served as assistant athletic director from 1987 to 1989. He was media coordinator for several NCAA basketball regional tournaments and the 1985 NCAA Final Four in Lexington. In addition, Rice was a columnist and managing editor for the Cats' Pause (also on ExploreUK), a publication devoted to UK sports information, and the author of several books about UK sports since 1975 including "Wildcats: Kentucky Football" (1975); "Adolph Rupp: Kentucky's Basketball Baron" (1994); and "The University of Kentucky Basketball Vault" (2008).
After graduating from UK in 1951, Rice began his career as a newspaper city editor for The Mountain Eagle in Whitesburg, Kentucky, and the Hazard-Herald in Hazard, Kentucky. He became a reporter in 1953 and sports editor in 1962 for the Lexington Leader.
UK Special Collections Research Center is home to UK Libraries' collection of rare books, Kentuckiana, the Archives, the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, the King Library Press, the Wendell H. Ford Public Policy Research Center, the Bert T. Combs Appalachian collection and ExploreUK. The mission of the center is to locate and preserve materials documenting the social, cultural, economic and political history of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
MEDIA CONTACT: Whitney Hale, 859-257-8716; whitney.hale@uky.edu