Three years ago, the 1984 Summer Olympics...

Three years ago, the 1984 Summer Olympics opened in Los Angeles. To commemorate that event, officials of the Amateur Athletic Foundation of Los Angeles held a ground-breaking ceremony for the $3-million Paul Ziffren Sports Resource Center.

The center, to be built adjacent to the grounds of the current Amateur Athletic Center at 2141 W. Adams Blvd., will be named for the man who was the chairman of the organizing committee for the ’84 Games and is currently the chairman of the AAF’s board of directors.

The 8,000-foot structure, expected to be completed next summer, will house a library of sports books and photos, as well as video material. It will also be used for seminars and sports-related conferences. Much of the material that once belonged to the Helms Hall of Fame, later the First Interstate Bank Hall of Fame, will be part of the Ziffren Center collection.

Among those participating in the ceremony, besides Ziffren, were Anita DeFrantz, president of the AAF; Mayor Tom Bradley; George Raveling, USC basketball coach; Paul Gonzales, former Olympic boxing gold medalist; Calrita Hunsberger Neher Chapman, former Olympic diver; Regina Jacobs, current U.S. champion in the women’s 1,500-meter run; Rafer Johnson, former Olympic decathlon gold medalist, and Harry Usher, general manager of the ’84 Games.