USU Archivists Win Philip M. Hamer and Elizabeth Hamer Kegan Award for Outdoor Recreation Archive

LOGAN — Clint Pumphrey and Chase Anderson of Utah State University have been named 2026 recipients of an award from the Society of American Archivists for building the Outdoor Recreation Archive.

The Philip M. Hamer and Elizabeth Hamer Kegan Award recognizes individuals or institutions that have significantly increased public awareness of archival materials through compilation, exhibition or public presentation. Pumphrey, manuscript curator for USU Special Collections and Archives, and Anderson, industry relations manager for USU’s Outdoor Product Design & Development program, will receive the award during the Society of American Archivists’ Annual Meeting, July 29 to Aug. 1 in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Started in 2017, the Outdoor Recreation Archive has grown into the world’s largest collection of outdoor gear catalogs, alongside photographs, periodicals and audiovisual materials documenting more than a century of outdoor industry history. Industry partners have sponsored Outdoor Recreation Archive exhibits in Paris, Tokyo, London, Munich, New York City, Nashville and Portland, Oregon.

In 2025 alone, the Outdoor Recreation Archive hosted 11 outdoor brand design teams seeking historical inspiration and drew coverage from 27 media outlets worldwide, including Monocle and the Japanese magazines 2nd and Popeye. That attention followed the 2025 release of Pumphrey and Anderson’s book, The Outdoor Archive, which they were invited to write by UK publisher Thames & Hudson. The Salt Lake Tribune also featured the archive in a story for Utah readers. The archive is also woven into Outdoor Product Design & Development’s curriculum, giving USU students direct access to the collection for their coursework.

Historian Rachel Gross described the Outdoor Recreation Archive as “an unmatched resource” for academic research on outdoor recreation and gear history. Liz Woolcott, associate dean and department head of Library Collections and Discovery at USU Libraries, wrote in support of the nomination that the archive “represents a remarkable achievement in archival innovation, interdisciplinary collaboration, and public engagement; an achievement that has significantly expanded both the reach and relevance of archival work within and beyond the academy.”