By Tim Graham
The Pro Football Hall of Fame will dedicate the Ralph Wilson Jr. Pro Football Research and Preservation Center next Friday morning as part of its induction weekend.
Wilson donated $2.5 million to the Hall of Fame to construct the 10,000-square-foot facility. He and his wife are scheduled to be in Canton for the ribbon-cutting ceremony along with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
"Ralph Wilson's outstanding contributions to pro football over many decades are legendary," Steve Perry, Hall of Fame president and executive director, said in a news release. "His generous gift has greatly enhanced our ability to preserve the Hall of Fame's rapidly growing collection of historic documents and artifacts."
The Wilson Research and Preservation Center will house more than 20 million document pages and 3 million photographs from the Hall of Fame's collection. It will include a rare-books room, a researcher's reading room and a video-conferencing lab to connect schools around the country to the Hall of Fame's resources.
