Ric And Chloé Mayers Gift $1 Million To Tuscaloosa Academy Project

A new era of athletics is taking shape at Tuscaloosa Academy. Ground was officially broken in May 2026 on the future Mayers Athletic Center, a 23,000-square-foot facility designed to expand opportunities for Knights athletes and enrich the student experience for years to come.

Get our free mobile app

The $7 million project was fueled by the generosity of the TA community, with more than $5.1 million already committed through the school’s capital campaign, including a transformational $1 million gift from a local businessman, Ric Mayers and his wife, Chloé. In recognition of that generosity, the school will proudly name its new athletic center after the Mayers family.

With construction expected to take roughly a year, the vision is quickly moving from a campaign promise to a landmark that will soon become part of everyday life at TA. With an official email last week from Beckie Share, The Head of School, TA families and donors were told that the construction project is finally beginning, and now, you can see it.

Construction fencing is officially in place, machinery is arriving, and work is getting underway on the new Mayers Athletic Building, a transformational addition that will serve Knights students, families, and the broader school community for generations to come.

For the TA community, this moment represents more than construction. It is the physical beginning of a vision. It's one that will expand opportunities for students and strengthen the school’s future.

As Mrs. Share reminded families, there will inevitably be dust, detours, and a few changes that will create a few minor inconveniences along the way, but those temporary inconveniences pale beside what is being created. It's not just clearing land and constructing a new building, it's shaping the future of what comes next and building excellence along the way.

LOOK: See how much gasoline cost the year you started driving

To find out more about how has the price of gas changed throughout the years, Stacker ran the numbers on the cost of a gallon of gasoline for each of the last 84 years. Using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (released in April 2020), we analyzed the average price for a gallon of unleaded regular gasoline from 1976 to 2020 along with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for unleaded regular gasoline from 1937 to 1976, including the absolute and inflation-adjusted prices for each year.

Read on to explore the cost of gas over time and rediscover just how much a gallon was when you first started driving.

Gallery Credit: Sophia Crisafulli

Source: Tuscaloosa Academy New Athletic Center Underway