Smithsonian Traveling Exhibition Celebrating Sports
in American Communities Coming to Bryan, Texas

Baseball. Soccer. Hockey. Bowling. Kickball. Surfing. People around the country are drawn to compete in these sports and many others. Still more gather on the sidelines to cheer for their favorite athletes and teams. Nowhere do Americans more intimately connect to sports than in their hometowns. The Brazos Valley African American Museum, in cooperation with Texas State Historical Association, will celebrate this connection as it hosts “Hometown Teams: How Sports Shape America,” a traveling exhibition from the Smithsonian’s Museum on Main Street program. “Hometown Teams” will be on view May 5, 2018 through June 9, 2018.
Brazos Valley African American Museum and the surrounding community has been expressly chosen by the Texas State Historical Association to host “Hometown Teams” as part of the Museum on Main Street program—a national/state/local partnership to bring exhibitions and programs to rural cultural organizations. The exhibition will tour 7 communities in Texas from Marshall through Claude.
“We are very pleased to be able to bring ‘Hometown Teams’ to our area,” said Crystal Spruill Carter, Director. “It allows us the opportunity to explore this fascinating aspect of our own region’s sports history and we hope that it will inspire many to become even more involved in the cultural life of our community.”
“Allowing all of our state’s residents to have access to the cultural resources of our nation’s premiere museum is a priority of the Texas State Historical Association,” said Stephen S. Cure, Chief Operating Officer.
“Hometown Teams: How Sports Shape America” is part of Museum on Main Street, a unique collaboration between the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES), state humanities
councils across the nation, and local host institutions. To learn more about Hometown Teams and other Museum on Main Street exhibitions, visit www.museumonmainstreet.org.
Support for Museum on Main Street has been provided by the United States Congress. Hometown Teams has been made possible in Bryan, Texas by the Texas State Historical Association and in part through Hotel Tax Revenue funded from the City of College Station and the City of Bryan through the Arts Council.
SITES has been sharing the wealth of Smithsonian collections and research programs with millions of people outside Washington, D.C., for more than 60 years. SITES connects Americans to their shared cultural heritage through a wide range of exhibitions about art, science, and history, which are shown wherever people live, work and play. For exhibition description and tour schedules, visit www.sites.si.edu.