History
The modern University of Florida was created in 1905 when the Florida Legislature passed the Buckman Act, and thereby consolidated the university's four predecessor institutions into the new "University of the State of Florida." The university fielded its first varsity baseball team, and enjoyed its first winning baseball season, in 1912.
During most of the Gators baseball program's early existence, the new university's athletic association suffered from a lack of financial resources, and few of the Gators head baseball coaches were full-time baseball coaches. William G. Kline was also the athletic director, head football coach, and head basketball coach; James L. White was the Gators' athletic director and head basketball coach; Brady Cowell, Ben Clemons and Lewie Hardage were assistant football coaches; and Sam McAllister was the head basketball coach and an assistant football coach. A notable exception was Lance Richbourg, who was a Florida alumnus and a Major League Baseball outfielder for the Boston Braves and others, and led the Gators to an impressive 39–21 overall record (a .650 winning percentage) in 1922, 1923 and 1926. McAllister was the Gators' last pre-World War II coach, and he returned from military service to lead the Gators baseball team again in 1946 and 1947.
Read more about this topic: Florida Gators Baseball
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“All things are moral. That soul, which within us is a sentiment, outside of us is a law. We feel its inspiration; out there in history we can see its fatal strength.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The history of philosophy is to a great extent that of a certain clash of human temperaments.”
—William James (1842–1910)
“To history therefore I must refer for answer, in which it would be an unhappy passage indeed, which should shew by what fatal indulgence of subordinate views and passions, a contest for an atom had defeated well founded prospects of giving liberty to half the globe.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)