AUSTIN, Texas — Lorne Michaels, the creator of the long-running sketch comedy television show “Saturday Night Live,” has donated his career archive to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, the center announced.

The collection includes behind-the-scenes rehearsal notes, scripts and photographs of iconic characters and sketches from a show that launched the careers of comedians Gilda Radner, John Belushi, Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler and others. It also includes some of 80-year-old Michaels’ personal correspondence.

“SNL,” the most Emmy Award-nominated show in television history, is in its 50th season. It is set to broadcast “SNL50: The Anniversary Special” live on Feb. 16.

Although way off Broadway and far from the show’s New York City roots, the Ransom Center is one of the top literary and humanities archives and research institutions in the country.

Its literary archive includes the collections of Nobel Prize winner J.M. Coetzee, Pulitzer Prize winners David Mamet and Norman Mailer, actor Robert DeNiro, the television drama “Mad Men” and the “Gone With the Wind” collection of Hollywood producer David O. Selznick.