Chicago Couple Give Northwestern U. $480 Million Gift

Patrick and Shirley Ryan are giving Northwestern University $480 million. The contribution will support education and research programs in applied microeconomics, business, digital medicine, neuroscience, and global health, plus translational research efforts at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern officials announced on Wednesday. Some of the money is earmarked for renovations of Ryan Field, a sports stadium previously named for the couple, and other building projects.

The Ryans are Northwestern alumni whose net worth Forbes pegs at $7.3 billion. Patrick Ryan is a Chicago businessman who in the 1950s sold scrapbooks to fellow students to pay for his Northwestern education. He started his professional career selling life insurance and went on to start his own insurance company, Pat Ryan and Associates, in 1964. He spent the next 20 years buying other insurance companies to form the Ryan Insurance Group, which eventually became the Aon Corporation in 1987. He served as CEO and chairman for most of his career.

He retired from the company in 2008 and in 2010 founded Ryan Specialty Group, a company that provides specialty products and services for insurance brokers, agents, and carriers.

Patrick Ryan earned a bachelor’s degree in business from the university in 1959 and served as chairman of the university’s Board of Trustees for 14 years. Shirley Ryan earned a bachelor’s degree in English from the university in 1961.

Shirley Ryan co-founded Pathways Pediatric Clinic, where she served as chairman for 33 years. She also started the Pathways.org Medical Round Table to guide content for Pathways.org, a website and social-media platform that provide free videos and other online tools to help parents track and improve their infants’ motor, sensory, and communication skills. She has also served on the National Council on Disability.

In 2015, the Ryans gave Northwestern $25 million to support research and teaching programs, earmarking $10 million of that gift to match other donations to establish new endowed professorships in a variety of fields. Two of the couple’s three sons are Northwestern alumni and another formerly served on the staff of the university’s athletics department.