In the Arts: Dallas Benefactor Nancy Hamon Dies at 92

Nancy B. Hamon, the widow of a wealthy Texas oilman who used her inheritance to become one of Texas’s leading patrons of the arts, died Saturday at the age of 92, The Dallas Morning News reports.

Ms. Hamon took over her husband Jake L. Hamon’s oil firm when the wildcatter died in 1985. Since then she has donated tens of millions of dollars to culture groups, primarily in Dallas, including $20-million to the Dallas Museum of Art, $10-million to Winspear Opera House, and $10-million to Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.

She was also a major donor to Southern Methodist University and gave $25-million to the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center for biomedical research.

In other arts news, a Pennsylvania judge heard arguments Monday in what amounts to a last-ditch attempt to block the transfer of the Barnes Foundation’s priceless art collection, The Philadelphia Inquirer writes.

Opponents of the move argued that then-Pennsylvania Attorney General Mike Fisher improperly influenced the foundation’s board to secure approval to move the collection from its longtime home in suburban Merion, Pa., to a new museum now under construction in downtown Philadelphia.

Representing the state, Lawrence Barth, a senior deputy attorney general, said his office was not obliged to be neutral in the matter but “represents the public interest,” which he said was best served in this case by relocating the Barnes collection.

Montgomery County Orphans’ Court Judge Stanley R. Ott did not say when he would rule on the move opponents’ petition to fully reopen the Barnes case.

Read a Chronicle of Philanthropy opinion column on the Barnes collection move and a documentary about the controversy.