Heiress Bequeaths Major Paintings to 3 Museums; Other Recent Gifts

The philanthropist and art collector Betsey Cushing Roosevelt Whitney, who died March 25 at age 89, has bequeathed 16 paintings by early-modern masters to three museums.

The value of the works has been estimated as high as $300-million.

The National Gallery of Art, in Washington, will receive eight paintings — one each by Vincent van Gogh, Henri Matisse, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Georges Braque, Raoul Dufy, Maurice de Vlaminck, Albert Marquet, and Kees van Dongen.

The Museum of Modern Art, in New York, will receive one painting each by van Gogh, Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Paul Cezanne, George Bellows, Henri-Edmond Cross, and Paul Signac.

And the Yale University Art Gallery, in New Haven, Conn., will receive Claude Monet’s “Camille on the Beach, Trouvelle” (1870).

The National Gallery’s painting by van Gogh is his “Self-Portrait” (1889), which was the first canvas he completed after suffering a nervous breakdown at the asylum of Saint-Remy, France. The MOMA’s Picasso, entitled “Yo” (1901), is also a self-portrait, and one of his earlier works.

Mrs. Whitney was the widow of John Hay (Jock) Whitney, former ambassador to Great Britain and chairman of the International Herald-Tribune.

The two had amassed a formidable trove of art. In 1983, 73 pieces from their collection went on temporary display at the National Gallery. Mr. Whitney had served as a trustee of that institution from 1961 to 1979, and in 1982 had donated $2-million to its acquisitions fund.

He had also been a trustee of Yale, and both he and his wife had served as trustees of the Museum of Modern Art.

Three universities have also received big gifts:

* A Bible teacher in Texas has bequeathed her entire estate — $26.5-million — to Abilene Christian University to endow its College of Biblical Studies.

Grace L. Woodward, who inherited money from her father’s oil business and lived thriftily until her death last April, took her only son Robert’s advice: to bypass him in her will and give the money to charity.

The university will use the endowment income for stipends for faculty members and scholarships for men preparing for the ministry.

* The philanthropist Joan B. Kroc has given $25-million to the University of San Diego to establish a peace-studies center.

The Mohandas K. Gandhi Institute for Peace and Justice is expected to open in 2000. The gift is intended to pay for construction of the institute and for the development of its programs. The curricula is expected to draw from many academic disciplines, and the center plans to sponsor international conferences and symposia.

Mrs. Kroc, the former owner of the San Diego Padres baseball team, is the widow of Ray A. Kroc, founder of the McDonald’s restaurant chain.

* The University of Maryland at College Park has received $15-million for its business school from Robert H. Smith, a real-estate developer.

The gift will endow professorships, scholarships, fellowships, a career-management center, and a dean’s discretionary fund. Mr. Smith, for whom the school has been renamed, is co-chairman of Charles E. Smith Residential Realty, in Crystal City, Va.

Other recent gifts:

Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art (Tex.): $5,000,000 from Jack S. Blanton of Houston, president of Eddy Refining and chairman of the Houston Endowment, and his wife, Laura Lee, for the capital campaign, and $2,000,000 from Perry R. Bass of Fort Worth, president and director of Perry R. Bass Inc., an investment company, and his wife, Nancy Lee, for the capital campaign. This fine-arts museum of the U. of Texas at Austin had been named the Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery.

Bowdoin College (Me.): $5,300,000 from Barry Wish of Palm Beach, Fla., chairman emeritus of Ocwen Financial Corporation, and his wife, Oblio, to renovate and expand theater facilities, and for general operating support.

Congregation B’nai Israel (Fla.): $1,000,000 from Harvey Sandler of Boca Raton, Fla., a former vice-president at Goldman Sachs and founder of Sandler Capital Management, and his wife, Phyllis, a financial planner, for a Jewish-education building.

Cumberland U. (Tenn.): Real estate valued at $1,100,000 from Jack Stewart of Hermitage, Tenn., a retired real-estate developer, and his wife, Virginia, for undetermined use.

Drew U. (N.J.): $1,000,000 from an anonymous donor to endow three scholarships at the theological school.

Emerson College (Mass.): $1,000,000 from Edmund N. Ansin of Miami, president of Sunbeam Television Corporation, to build new studios for the college’s student-operated radio station.

Emporia State U. (Kan.): A residence and property valued at $1,000,000 from E. L. (Bud) Hopkins of Emporia, Kan., chairman of Hopkins Manufacturing Corporation, and his wife, Irene, to be used as the president’s residence.

Howard U. (D.C.): $1,200,000 bequest from the estates of Hilyard Robinson of Washington, an architect, city planner, and inventor, and his wife, Helena, for the School of Architecture and Design and the Division of Fine Arts.

The Johns Hopkins U. (Md.): $1,000,000 from David Koch of New York, executive vice-president of Koch Industries, for prostate-cancer research at the Brady Urological Institute at the School of Medicine, and $1,000,000 from an anonymous donor for pediatric-cancer research at the Oncology Center of Johns Hopkins Medicine.

Lambuth U. (Tenn.): $1,500,000 from Jeanne Varnell of Memphis, a retired human-resources consultant and trainer, and her husband, Henry, a retired executive at Exxon, for faculty development.

Methodist Hospitals Foundation (Tenn.): $1,000,000 from Ralph S. Hamilton of Memphis, an ophthalmologist, and his wife, Barbara, for ophthalmology research at the University of Tennessee at Memphis.

National Rifle Association of America (Va.): $1,000,000 from William B. Ruger of Southport, Conn., chairman of Sturm Ruger & Company, a firearms manufacturer, for the new National Firearms Museum, which will trace the history of firearms in America from 1492 to the present.

Neuberger Museum of Art (N.Y.): $5,000,000 from Roy R. Neuberger of New York, founder of the investment firm Neuberger & Berman and founding patron of the museum, for the capital campaign, and $1,000,000 from Philip Straus of Mamaroneck, N.Y., vice-president at Neuberger & Berman, and his wife, Lynn, to establish a center for arts education.

New Gate School (Fla.): $1,000,000 from Wilson Alvarez of Sarasota, Fla., a pitcher for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays baseball team, and his wife, Daihanna, for the capital campaign. New Gate is a Montessori school for children in pre-kindergarten through eighth grade.

Pennsylvania State U.: $5,000,000 from Frank Pasquerilla of Johnstown, Pa., chairman of Crown American Realty Trust, and his family, for a spiritual center at the Eisenhower Chapel.

Pikeville College (Ky.): $1,000,000 from Leonard Lawson of Lexington, Ky., chairman of Mountain Enterprises, to renovate a residence hall.

Providence College (R.I.): $5,000,000 bequest from the estate of John C. Myrick of North Providence, R.I., a physician, for endowment.

Reed College (Ore.): $1,000,000 from John Sperling of Phoenix, chairman of the Apollo Group and founder of the University of Phoenix, for scholarships for Reed graduates who are pursuing Ph.D.’s at King’s College in Cambridge, England.

Renbrook School (Conn.): $1,000,000 from Paul Sullivan of West Hartford, Conn., a physician, and his wife, Melinda, to improve kitchen and dining facilities. Renbrook is a day school for children in pre-kindergarten through ninth grade.

Sonoma State U. (Cal.): $5,000,000 from Don Green of Santa Rosa, Cal., founder of Advanced Fibre Communications, and his wife, Maureen, to construct a music facility.

Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (Tex.): $6,000,000 from Harold Riley of Austin, Tex., chairman of Citizens Insurance, for the seminary’s capital campaign.

Stanford U. (Cal.): $1,000,000 from Reed Hastings of Santa Cruz, Cal., founder of Pure Software, for a program that will focus on technology in entrepreneurial studies at the School of Engineering.

Texas Tech U.: $3,000,000 from Paul Condit of Seminole, Tex., principal of Texas Equipment Company, and his wife, Patsy, for the College of Business Administration and the College of Human Sciences.

Trevecca Nazarene U. (Tenn.): $1,000,000 from an anonymous donor for the capital campaign. Tufts U. (Mass.): $1,500,000 from Arnold Van Hoven Bernhard of Westport, Conn., an investor, to endow a professorship in biology. U. of Dubuque (Iowa): $1,250,000 from Jackaline Baldwin Dunlap of Des Moines, an investment broker, for new technology equipment.

U. of Florida: $5,000,000 from Jerry Davis of Jacksonville, Fla., chairman of Computer Management Sciences, and his wife, Judith, for the College of Medicine’s cancer-research program. U. of Kansas: $2,000,000 from Jordan L. Haines of Wichita, Kan., retired chairman of Fourth Financial Corporation, and his wife, Shirley, for scholarships for Kansas residents.

U. of Minnesota-Twin Cities: $2,000,000 from Lee Sundet of Excelsior, Minn., former owner of two manufacturing companies and founder of Fountain Industries, his wife, Louise, and their family, to endow a professorship in New Testament and Christian studies, and to renovate the entrance of the Gibson-Nagurski Football Complex.

U. of Missouri at Rolla: $4,000,000 trust from the estate of Donald Hewson Radcliffe of Palos Verdes Estates, Cal., founder of an oil-exploration company, for scholarships in the department of geology and geophysics. Mr. Radcliffe died in 1959; the gift was received upon the recent death of his widow, Dorothy Dee.

U. of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: $1,300,000 from Lucius E. Burch III of Nashville, chairman of the Massey Burch Investment Group, a venture-capital company, for a program that will team undergraduate students and faculty members in various disciplines in field-research projects. U. of North Dakota: Stock valued at $2,000,000 from Ralph Engelstad of Las Vegas, Nev., owner of the Imperial Palace Hotel and Casino, and his wife, Betty, to endow athletics; and a collection of military documents from Mr. Engelstad valued at more than $1,000,000, for the library’s special collections.

U. of Southwestern Louisiana: Two charitable remainder trusts valued at $5,145,947 from an anonymous donor for the College of Engineering. Washington U. (Mo.): $6,500,000 from John F. McDonnell of St. Louis, former chairman of McDonnell Douglas and a director of the Boeing Company, and his brother, James S. McDonnell III of St. Louis, former corporate vice-president of McDonnell Douglas and a director of the Boeing Company, for three professorships and for undetermined use.

Whitworth College (Wash.): $1,000,000 from John Scotford of Poland, Ohio, retired chairman of the McBarscot Company, and his wife, Judy, for undetermined use.