Mt. Timpanogos: SUNDANCE

EUGENE L ROBERTS

Every time BYU's sports fans yell, "Go, Cougars!" they are unwittingly honoring Eugene Lusk Roberts (AB 1916), BYU's first athletics director. Roberts began calling athletes "cougars" when he wrote sports columns for a Salt Lake City newspaper -- and the name stuck. The cougar, however, represents more than a mascot. Roberts selected cougars because of the large cats that roamed the nearby Wasatch Mountains he hiked frequently. His hiking hobby led to the creation of the popular annual Timp hikes, which endured for nearly 60 years. A cougar himself, he was president of the 1904 class, was a campus journalist and artist, editor of the White and Blue, captain of the track team, substitute quarterback, and part of the first Utah intercollegiate track and field championships. He studied at Yale before accepting a job with athletics at BYU. His concern was fitness for all, and his objective was to minister to the health, physical and recreational welfare of the entire student body. While Roberts' name may be largely relegated to the records in BYU's Special Collections, he left a large footprint at his alma mater. In this video, we will see a glimpse of this remarkable man.

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