Oregon Sports History Program
Legacy In Motion
At the University of Oregon, our leadership in sports isn’t just a point of pride — it's a cornerstone of our identity.
From pioneering athletes to championship moments to sports product and marketing innovations, Oregon’s achievements have indelibly shaped the world of sports. And we continue to inspire a worldwide audience.
To ensure that future generations will appreciate the full scope of our athletic history, the Special Collections and University Archives of University of Oregon Libraries is committed to preserving UO’s rich heritage of athletics excellence. Launched in fall of 2024, the Oregon Sports History Program (OSHP) is dedicated to preserving and sharing this legacy with the world.
Through our careful collection and curation of historical documents, photos, films, artifacts, and more, we honor the victories, milestones, and stories that have defined our journey as a campus and a community.
Our sports history isn’t just written in records and statistics; it’s alive in the stories captured on film, the photographs that reflect our memories, and the documents that recount the efforts and triumphs of our athletes and coaches, teams and fans.
By safeguarding these chronicles of our past and providing public access to them, we ensure that UO’s influence on sports remains a source of pride, inspiration, and knowledge for present and future generations.
Help us preserve and celebrate Oregon Ducks history.
Through the OSHP, the library aims to:
- Develop a student internship in tandem with the UO’s 150th anniversary in 2026
- Present at the North American Society for Sports History conference
- Explore approaches to collecting materials related to NIL
- Acquire new collections representing women in sports
- Co-curate an exhibit featuring the iconic UO athletic photography of Brian Lanker (opening in Knight Library, fall 2025)
- Create interdisciplinary opportunities in Journalism, Business, and Human Physiology
"The Oregon Sports History Program is closely aligned with both University Archives’ mission to preserve and tell the story of the University’s history and impact and the UO Libraries’ strategy of enhancing community and civic engagement."
— Alicia Salaz, Vice Provost and University Librarian
Meet Lauren Goss, UO's Inaugural Athletics Archivist
A third-generation UO alum, Lauren Goss recently was named University of Oregon’s first Athletics Archivist — the only person on the West Coast to hold this position, after a lead gift from an anonymous donor. In just a few months, Lauren has already hit the ground running: growing our sports history collection and promoting the UO’s strong athletics brand and legacy through academic and public outreach.
Her accomplishments include:
- Giving expert commentary in multiple media outlets
- Teaching in classes in the Clark Honors College and the School of Law
- Starting a partnership with the new Olympic Studies Hub in the Lundquist College of Business
- Acquired new collections
- Visited a peer archivist at the University of Michigan, a national leader in athletic archiving
The Long Game
Our vision is to make this program permanent with a blend of spendable and endowed funds, so that the story of UO sports will be curated, preserved, and communicated for generations to come. We are actively seeking further investment from the UO community to accomplish this goal.
Empowering this program with a gift of your own will allow us to bridge athletics to academics as more collections become discoverable for emerging studies in sport.