Couple Leaves $80-Million to Iowa State University; Other Gifts

Several organizations have received big gifts.

* Iowa State University, in Ames, has received an anonymous $80-million bequest for its College of Agriculture. The Des Moines Register has identified the benefactors as Raymond Baker, a director of Pioneer Hi-Bred International, and his wife, Mary.

The gift is believed to be the largest ever for an agricultural college and will provide an estimated annual income of $4-million.

The couple had requested that the income support professorships, scholarships, and research and education projects. In 1996, they had pledged a trust valued at $4-million and an estate estimated at $30-million to endow the College of Agriculture. The couple had undervalued the estate on purpose in the hopes that the press would not try to discover their identities.

Raymond Baker died in January. His wife died a month later.

Thomas Mitchell, president of the university’s fund-raising foundation, said that since the announcement of the couple’s gift earlier this month, Iowa State has received $6-million in new gifts. Those donors, Mr. Mitchell said, “have stretched their commitments because of the trust instilled by a gift of this size.”

* The Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, in Washington, has received a trove of 5,000 Chinese antiquities collected by the late Paul Singer, a New Jersey psychiatrist. The artworks are valued by the gallery’s director, Milo Beach, at up to $60-million.

Dr. Singer started collecting Chinese artworks when he was 17, favoring archaeological artifacts. A native of Hungary, he moved to the United States and in 1957 befriended Arthur Sackler, a fellow psychiatrist and collector of Asian art.

Dr. Singer died in 1997. The gallery credits the Arthur M. Sackler Foundation; the AMS Foundation for the Arts, Sciences and Humanities; the children of Arthur Sackler; and Dr. Singer with making the gift.

* Robert C. McNair, founder of the energy company Cogen Technologies, and his wife, Janice, have given $17.5-million to Rice University, in Houston. The couple made the donation to strengthen the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management.

* Phillips Exeter Academy, in Exeter, N.H., has received $15-million from Stanford N. Phelps, chairman of Commonwealth Oil Refining, for a science center.

* Drexel University, in Philadelphia, has received $10-million from 1960 alumnus Bennett S. LeBow for its Business College. Mr. LeBow is chairman of the Brooke Group, a publicly held company that counts the cigarette manufacturer Ligget Group among its holdings.

Other recent gifts:

Canisius College (N.Y.): $1,275,000 bequest from the estate of Rupert Warren of Buffalo, N.Y., retired president of Trico Products Corporation, to endow scholarships.

City Colleges of Chicago Kennedy-King College: $1,200,000 bequest from the estate of Florence Coles Ballenger of Clearwater, Fla., a teacher and investor, for unrestricted use.

Cornell U. (N.Y.): $2,500,000 from Robert G. Laughlin of Cincinnati, a research fellow at Procter & Gamble, to endow a professorship in physical chemistry at the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology.

Eastern Illinois U.: $1,200,000 bequest from the estate of Florence Coles Ballenger of Clearwater, Fla., a teacher and investor, for unrestricted use.

Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America (N.Y.): $1,000,000 from Michael R. Bloomberg of New York, founder of Bloomberg Financial Markets, and his sister Marjorie Tiven, of Atlanta, to establish a scholarship fund for teen-agers to attend Tel Yehudah Camp, in Barryville, N.Y.

Medical U. of South Carolina: Stocks valued at $4,500,000 from Michael (Mickey) P. Araneo of James Island, S.C., who owned discount pharmacies in the Charleston, S.C., area, for the university’s Pharmaceutical Development Center.

Museum of Photographic Arts (Cal.): $1,000,000 from David C. Copley of San Diego, president of Copley Press, and $1,000,000 from Irwin Jacobs of San Diego, chairman of Qualcomm, and his wife, Joan. Both gifts are for the museum’s renovation.

Ohio State U.: $4,000,000 from Raymond E. Mason, Jr., of Columbus, Ohio, a retired U.S. Army Major General and founder of Columbus Truck and Equipment Company, to support the Fisher College of Business; bequests totaling $2,500,000 from the estate of John W. Berry, Sr., of Dayton, Ohio, former chairman of Berry Investments, to endow the dean’s position at the Fisher College of Business and to recruit faculty members to the college; and $2,000,000 from the family of Floyd Younkin of Columbus, Ohio, a realtor and founder of several businesses, including the telecommunications company Dycom Industries, for the Younkin Success Center, a counseling and learning center for students.

Saint Cloud State U.: $3,000,000 from the family of the late George Robert Herberger of Paradise Valley, Ariz., the founder of Herberger’s Department Stores, to endow the College of Business.

St. Petersburg Junior College (Fla.): $1,200,000 bequest from the estate of Florence Coles Ballenger of Clearwater, Fla., a teacher and investor, for the “Women on the Way” program and the Learning Support Center at the Clearwater campus.

Texas A&M U. at Corpus Christi: $1,000,000 from the family of the late Rogelio (Roger) Benavides of Corpus Christi, an employee at American Chrome & Chemicals, to endow an engineering professorship that will emphasize industrial safety. Mr. Benavides died in 1989 when he fell through a walkway at his job. His family received an undisclosed settlement in March after suing the company for gross negligence.

U. of Akron (Ohio): $1,750,000 from James D. D’lanni of Akron, retired director of research at the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, for graduate fellowships, research funds, and research equipment.

U. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: $6,500,000 bequest from the estate of Leiby S. Hall of Decatur, Ill., founder of TCF Industries, a delivery business, for scholarships at the College of Commerce and Business Administration and for a professorship in economics.

U. of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston: $1,000,000 from Nelda C. Lutcher Stark of Orange, Tex., whose late husband, H. J., was an oil and lumber businessman, to establish a professorship in internal medicine.

United Way/Capital Area (Tex.): $1,000,000 from Michael Dell of Austin, chairman of Dell Computer Corporation, and his wife, Susan, for the Community Fund, which supports 47 health and human-services organizations in central Texas. The Dells stipulated that their gift be matched, dollar for dollar, by new or increased donations of $10,000 or more.

Westminster School (Conn.): $1,000,000 from the family of the late John T. Perkin of Fairfield, Conn., vice-president at A.G. Edwards & Sons, an investment firm, for endowment.