From University Gymnasium to the first academic building named to honor a woman

Kathryn Chicone Ustler Hall, formerly known as the Women's Gymnasium and University Gymnasium, stands as a historic building on the campus of the University of Florida. Designed by William Augustus Edwards in the Collegiate Gothic style, it opened in 1919 as the University Gymnasium. In that capacity, the building was the first home of the Florida Gators men's basketball team and served as the home court for most of the university's indoor sports programs until the Florida Gymnasium opened in the late 1940s.

In 1948, the same year the university became fully co-educational, the building was rechristened the Women's Gymnasium. It was repurposed as a recreation center and physical education space for the school's new female students. By 1980, the opening of the O'Connell Center made the old gym obsolete. Although the building was slated for demolition in the 1980s, it was saved for its historic value and was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1988. For over a decade, it remained underutilized and was used primarily as a storage facility.

With a donation from UF alumna Kathryn Chicone Ustler in 2000, the building was transformed into a 14,700-square-foot three-story academic building. The restoration was completed in July 2006, and the university's Women's Studies Department moved into the newly renamed Ustler Hall. It was the first academic building on the UF campus named to honor a woman, and at the time of its rededication, it was the only freestanding campus building in the United States devoted solely to Women's Studies.

Today, the building houses the university's Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies and the Center for Women's and Gender Studies Research. It remains a significant piece of the campus's history, having transitioned from a sports venue to a center for academic study in Gainesville.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons