Ruston

The Samuel M. Thomas Assembly Center is an 8,098-seat multi-purpose arena in Ruston, Louisiana. The arena, named for its benefactor and businessman... Samuel M. Thomas, is home to the Division I NCAA Louisiana Tech University Bulldogs and Lady Techsters basketball teams. The arena opened in November of 1982 just west of Joe Aillet Stadium, and replaced the then-thirty year old Memorial Gymnasium on the corner of Tech Drive and Railroad Avenue. The men's basketball team hosted the Southland Conference tournament in the TAC in 1985 and 1987, and three NIT games, in 1986 and two games in 2002. The women's team has hosted the first, second and regional rounds of the NCAA Women's Basketball tournament nineteen times, most recently in 2003. The TAC also serves as the home of the Louisiana Tech Woman's Volleyball since the program's inception in 1987. NBA greats such as Karl Malone, P.J. Brown, Randy White and Paul Millsap have all called the Thomas Assembly Center home during their collegiate careers.
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Karl Anthony Malone , nicknamed "The Mailman," is a retired American professional basketball power forward. In his basketball career, Malone spent... his first 18 seasons with the Utah Jazz and formed a formidable duo with his teammate John Stockton. He played his final season with the Los Angeles Lakers. Malone grew up in rural Summerfield, Louisiana and played college basketball at Louisiana Tech University. In his three seasons with Louisiana Tech, he helped the Bulldogs basketball team to its first-ever NCAA tournament in 1984 and to first place in the Southland Conference in 1985. The Jazz drafted Malone in 1985 with the 13th overall pick in the first round. Having scored 36,298 points in his career, the second most career points in NBA history, and holding the record for most free throws both attempted and made, Malone is generally considered one of the greatest NBA power forwards. In 1997 and 1999, Malone won the NBA Most Valuable Player award. Malone appeared in the playoffs every season in his career, including three NBA Finals: in 1997 and 1998 with the Jazz and in 2004 with the Lakers.
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Edward Gay Robinson was an American football coach. For 57 years from 1941 to 1997, he was the head coach at Grambling State University, a... historically black university in Louisiana. He is the most winning football coach in Football Championship Subdivision history with 408 wins. At the time of his retirement in 1997, he was the most winning coach in college football history. Joe Paterno of Penn State broke his record for the most division I wins in 2011 with 409 wins. Robinson was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1997. Robinson was born in Jackson in East Feliciana Parish, Louisiana, to the son of a sharecropper and a domestic worker. He went on to graduate from McKinley Senior High School in Baton Rouge in 1937. He went on to earn his bachelor's degree from Leland College in Baker in East Baton Rouge Parish, then went on to obtain his Master's degree from the University of Iowa in Iowa City in 1954. Robinson was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity.
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Jeff Mangum is a musician best known for being the lyricist, vocalist and guitarist of the band Neutral Milk Hotel, as well as being one of the... cofounders of The Elephant 6 Recording Company. Mangum, along with the other members of the Elephant 6, attended Ruston High School in the late 1980s. The friends shared a passion for bands of the 1960s such as The Zombies, as well as an affinity for newer, noisier bands such as Sonic Youth and Minutemen. They reflected these influences in the tapes they recorded and shared with each other, forming the seeds of what would become the Elephant 6 Collective.
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Theresa Meeker is an Italian-American actress and model. Theresa hails from Williamson County, Tennessee although she was raised in Sumatra,... Indonesia by mother Judith Meeker, who is a teacher who was profiled in TIME magazine issue December 2002, and father Dr. William Meeker MD, who was a physician and volunteer for Mother Theresa's orphanage in Calcutta, India. Theresa studied film and television acting at the performing arts school Michael Howard Studios as well as Larry Singer Studios in New York City. She received a BA in history from Flagler College of St. Augustine, Florida and she is currently pursuing a Master of Education in elementary education at Vanderbilt University Peabody College of Education with several scholarships. Theresa starred in avant-garde short film Look, which won awards in the Accolade Competition, Best Shorts Competition, California Film Awards and Honolulu Film Awards, while it received an important 4-star review from Film Threat. Theresa plays a supermodel in Look with a wardrobe / visuals inspired by Coco Chanel short films. Theresa appears in a pictorial in 2012 Vol. 7 No.
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