Massachusetts College Receives $27-Million Bequest; Other Recent Gifts

Seven institutions have received big gifts:

• Wellesley College, in Massachusetts, has received a $27-million bequest from Leonie Faroll to renovate the college’s power plant and science center, as well as buy equipment for the center. Ms. Faroll, who died in 2003, was a marketing analyst at Scudder, Stevens & Clark, in New York, and was a member of the college’s class of 1949. She made her money primarily from investing her earnings and an inheritance.
• Middlebury College, in Vermont, has received $20-million from Shelby M.C. Davis and his wife, Gale, to establish a headquarters at the college for a scholarship program that offers financial aid to students from other countries who attend American colleges. Mr. Davis, the founder of Davis Advisors, an investment company, in Santa Fe, N.M., and New York, has supported scholarship programs for students from overseas at four other U.S. colleges and universities. The Davises live in Jackson Hole, Wyo.
• Robert Weissman, chairman of Shelburne Investments, in western Massachusetts, and his wife, Jan, have given $20-million to Babson College, in Wellesley, Mass. A portion of the money must be used for financial aid, but the rest can be used any way the college wants. Mr. Weissman, who graduated from the college in 1964, serves on its Board of Trustees.
• Nick J. Labedz, of Brentwood, Calif., has given $15-million to Wayne State University, in Detroit, for a new academic building in the School of Medicine and to renovate its library. Mr. Labedz, who formerly taught English and history in Michigan, is now a real-estate investor in California.
• The University of South Florida, in Tampa, has received $11.5-million from Kiran C. and Pallavi Patel for a new building and to endow a center for research on globalization. The couple has pledged an additional $7-million if the university raises $14-million for the center by 2009. Kiran Patel is a cardiologist and serves on the university’s Board of Trustees; Pallavi Patel is a pediatrician.

  4Leon D. Black, the founder of two New York investment firms, Apollo Advisors and Lion Advisors, has pledged $10-million to the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in New York, for a new institute on stem-cell research. Mr. Black has served on Mount Sinai Hospital’s Board of Trustees since 1994.

• Thomas C. Jones, retired president of Cigna Retirement & Investment Services, has pledged $10-million to the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor for its Ross School of Business. The money, part of which has been paid, will establish a center that will enable undergraduate business students to take graduate-level courses and provide them with other opportunities. Mr. Jones, who lives in Ann Arbor, received an M.B.A. from the business school in 1971. He has left the remainder of the gift in his will.

Other recent gifts:

American U., Washington College of Law (D.C.): $2-million from Robert F. and Susan Pence for programs at its library. Mr. Pence is president of Pence-Friedel Developers, a commercial real-estate firm in McLean, Va., and president of Grand Duke Hotels and of the Dulles Expo Center, both in Chantilly, Va.

Bacone College (Muskogee, Okla.): $1-million bequest from Lee Frances Bowler to endow nursing student scholarships, with priority given to American Indian students. Ms. Bowler, who died last year, lived in Washington and worked in public relations for the United States Postal Service.

Brookings Institution (Washington): $1-million from James D. Wolfensohn, the former president of the World Bank, in Washington, to support research on global development and poverty and help start a policy center at Brookings that will focus on those topics. Mr. Wolfensohn has served on the think tank’s Board of Trustees since 1983.

Church Divinity School of the Pacific (Berkeley, Calif.): $1.5-million pledge from Ann Swindells, of Portland, Ore., and Rancho Mirage, Calif., to endow a chair in Old Testament studies. Her husband, Bill, is a retired chief executive of Willamette Industries, a lumber-products company in Portland. The divinity school also received a $1-million pledge from an anonymous donor for improvements to Gibbs Hall.

Columbia College (Mo.): $3.1-million bequest from Carol Vinkemulder Frobish, of Mission Viejo, Calif., for scholarships for female students who plan to major in business and for unrestricted support. Ms. Frobish, who owned a Chevron gas station in San Clemente, Calif., with her late husband, Kenneth, died in 2003. The college also received a $1.3-million bequest from Genevieve Koontz Buchanan, a teacher in Kansas City, Mo., who graduated from the college in 1938, for scholarships.

Connecticut College (New London): $2-million from John F. Niblack, retired president of Pfizer Global Research and Development, in New London, and his wife, Heidi, to endow a professorship in Asian art and pay for a curator of the college’s Asian art collection.

Cooper Union (New York): $5-million pledge from Sandra Priest Rose for a new academic building. Ms. Rose, of New York, is the widow of Frederick P. Rose, a real-estate developer who died in 1999.

Dartmouth College (Hanover, N.H.): $6-million pledge from George and Roberta Berry, of Lincoln, Mass.; John Berry, chief executive officer of Berry Investments, in Dayton, Ohio, and his wife, Shirley; and Charles Berry, a trustee of the Berry Family Foundation, in Dayton; a $6-million pledge from Allen Bildner, of Short Hills, N.J., retired chairman of Kings Super Markets, and his wife, Joan; and a $6-million pledge from John Byrne Jr., chairman of the White Mountains Insurance Group, in Hanover, N.H., and his wife, Dorothy, president of the Byrne Foundation, in Hanover. Each gift will be used to pay for a new student residence hall.

Emerson College (Boston): $2-million pledge from an anonymous couple to endow a chair in screenwriting in the visual and media arts department of its School of Arts.

The Johns Hopkins U. (Baltimore): $2-million from Virginia Weiss, of Baltimore, for a new heart institute that will be housed in a cardiovascular and critical-care facility at Johns Hopkins Medicine.

Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Houston Gulf Coast Chapter: $1-million bequest from John Pulliam, a retired engineer with Brown & Root, for research. Mr. Pulliam, who died in November 2004, made the bequest in honor of his daughter, a pediatrician who was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes and died in February 2004.

New Mexico State U. (Las Cruces): $2-million from Stan Fulton for fellowships in the graduate program and for the equestrian and athletics programs and other support. Mr. Fulton is the owner of Sunland Park racetrack, in New Mexico.

North Carolina Wesleyan College (Rocky Mount): $1.26-million bequest from Frank E. Brown, a former employee at the Manchester Paperboard Company, in Richmond, Va., for general support. Mr. Brown, who died in 1976, stipulated in his will that the college had five years to match the gift in order to receive the money.

U. of Arkansas at Fayetteville: $2-million pledge from Daniel and Julianna Garrison, Thomas and Natalie Garrison, and William Garrison and Joana Heimel to create a financial institute and endow a chair in finance at the College of Business. The three men are brothers; their father, Sheridan Garrison, founded American Freightways, a Harrison, Ark., shipping company. Daniel and William Garrison are both retired executives at American Freightways, and Thomas Garrison is chairman and chief executive officer of Garrison Financial Corporation.

U. of Michigan at Ann Arbor: $5-million from Helen Zell, of Chicago, to increase graduate-student fellowships and stipends in the M.F.A. program in creative writing, to create a fund for the Zell Visiting Writers Lecture Series, and to endow the directorship of the creative-writing program. Ms. Zell, whose money stems from investments, graduated from the university in 1964.

U. of Oregon (Eugene): $1-million pledge from Joel and Colleen McCloud, of Torrance, Calif., for scholarships. Mr. McCloud, who received a master’s degree from the university in 1967, is president of McCloud Property Acquisitions. Ms. McCloud, a 1967 graduate of the university, is the retired executive vice president of the Los Angeles office of Foote, Cone and Belding, an advertising agency.

U. of Texas Southwestern Medical Foundation (Dallas): $1.23-million bequest from Maurice Jameson, who died in 2003, to endow research for scleroderma and macular degeneration. Ms. Jameson, who lived in Dallas, was the widow of William S. Jameson, an oil lawyer who died in 1998.

Wayne State U. (Detroit): $9-million from Yousif B. Ghafari, chairman of Ghafari Companies, an architectural and engineering firm in Dearborn, Mich., for a new engineering center and for student programs and scholarships. The money will also endow programs in engineering, mathematics, and medicine. Mr. Ghafari, who immigrated to the United States from Lebanon in the 1970s, earned three degrees at the university.