Ustler Hall

Women's Gymnasium
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Ustler Hall
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Location	Gainesville, Florida
Coordinates	29°39′1″N 82°20′49″W / 29.65028°N 82.34694°W / 29.65028; -82.34694
Built	1919
Architect	William Augustus Edwards
NRHP reference No.	79000660[1]
Added to NRHP	June 27, 1979

Kathryn Chicone Ustler Hall (formerly known as the Women's Gymnasium and University Gymnasium) is a historic building on the campus of the University of Florida (UF) in Gainesville, Florida. It was designed by William Augustus Edwards in the Collegiate Gothic style and 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 it continued to serve as the home court for most of the university's indoor sports programs until the Florida Gymnasium opened in the late 1940s. The university became co-educational at about the same time, and the building was rechristened the Women's Gymnasium and was repurposed as a recreation center for the school's many new female students. On June 27, 1979, it was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places.

The opening of O'Connell Center in 1980 and new student recreation facilities made the old gym obsolete, and it gradually fell into disuse. The building was slated for demolition in the 1980s but was saved for its historic value, though it was used primarily as a storage facility for several years. A large donation by UF alumnus Kathryn Ulster made it possible to completely transform the interior into modern classrooms, offices, and other educational spaces, and the university's Women's Studies Department moved into the newly renamed Ustler Hall in 2006. It was the first building on the UF campus named to honor a woman, and at its rededication, it was the only freestanding campus building in the United States devoted solely to Women's Studies.^[2]