Museum Gets $12-Million; Other New Donations

Seven institutions have received big gifts:

• The Crocker Art Museum, in Sacramento, has received $12-million from an anonymous donor to support its fund-raising effort, which aims to raise $100-million to expand its facilities.
• Arizona State University, in Tempe, has received $10-million from Julie A. Wrigley, president of Wrigley Investments, in Sun Valley, Idaho, which invests in stocks, hedge funds, and fixed-income securities, to endow four professorships in renewable-energy systems, sustainable business practices, global environmental change, and complex-systems dynamics. Ms. Wrigley gave $15-million in 2004 to establish the university’s Global Institute of Sustainability, of which she now serves as co-chair. Her late husband, William, was president of the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company, the chewing-gum manufacturer in Chicago.
• The Burr and Burton Academy, in Manchester, Vt., has received $10-million from Barry Rowland, retired chief administrative officer of Eaton Vance, a financial-management firm in Boston, and his wife, Wendy, for its endowment. Mr. Rowland is a member of the academy’s Board of Trustees.
• The Shriners Hospital for Children, in Cincinnati, has received an unrestricted gift of $10-million from an anonymous donor. Shriners Hospitals provide free treatment for children.
• The University of Cincinnati has received a pledge of $10-million from James L. Winkle, former owner of Winkle Discount Drug, in Hamilton, Ohio, and an investment executive at Patrick Financial Corporation, also in Hamilton, to support the university’s College of Pharmacy. Mr. Winkle graduated in 1958 with a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy.
• Wagner College, in New York, has received a pledge of $10-million from Michael Nicolais, retired president of Clark Estates, a financial- and business-management company in New York, and his wife, Margaret, to help construct a new academic building. Mr. and Ms. Nicolais both graduated from Wagner in 1949: He received a bachelor’s degree in business, and she received her degree in nursing.
• The Zoological Society of San Diego has received $10-million from Audrey Steele Burnand for its Elephant Odyssey exhibit complex, which will also include California condors, jaguars, lions, tapirs, and other animals. The zoo has also received a pledge of $10-million from Conrad T. Prebys, president of Progress Construction and Management, in San Diego, to create an elephant-management facility in the new elephant complex and renovate part of the polar-bear exhibit to accommodate orphaned wild cubs. Of the pledge, $6-million must be matched by other donors to the zoo.

Other recent gifts:

Arizona State U. Foundation (Tempe): $5-million from Craig Weatherup, former president of PepsiCo, the soft-drink company in Purchase, N.Y., and his wife, Connie, to help build a new basketball-practice facility. Mr. Weatherup is an alumnus of the university.

Boys & Girls Clubs of Boston: $3-million from Robert and Myra Kraft, owners of the Kraft Group, an investment-holdings company in Foxboro, Mass., and the New England Patriots football team, for its capital campaign. The charity has also received multiple other gifts for the campaign, including: $2.5-million from Paul Edgerley, a managing director of Bain Capital Partners, a private investment firm in Boston, and his wife, Sandy, chair of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Boston’s Board of Directors; $2.3-million from Gerald Jordan, president of Hellman, Jordan Management Company, a specialty-equity investment management firm in Boston, and his wife, Darlene, executive director of the Gerald R. Jordan Foundation, in Boston; $2.2-million from Jonathan Davis, chief executive officer of Davis Marcus Partners, a commercial real-estate development, investment, and management firm in Boston, and his wife, Margot; $1.1-million from John Fish, president of Suffolk Construction Company, in Boston, and his wife, Cynthia; $1-million from Edmund N. Ansin, president of Sunbeam Television, in Miami, and his brother, Ronald M. Ansin; $1-million from Michael A. Krupka, a managing director of Bain Capital Partners, and his wife, Anne C. Kubik; $1-million from Bernadette T. Rehnert, a member of the group’s Board of Directors; and $1-million from Robert Smith, a founding partner of Castanea Partners, a private-equity firm in Newton, Mass., and his wife, Dana. The organization has also received three anonymous gifts of $2-million each and six anonymous gifts of $1-million each.

CARE (Atlanta): $5-million partial challenge gift from Sheila C. Johnson, co-founder of Black Entertainment Television, in Washington. Ms. Johnson’s gift is earmarked for a campaign to raise awareness and support for poor women around the world. Most of the money, $4-million, will match donations by other supporters over the next two years, and the remaining $1-million will go toward marketing efforts for the campaign.

Crocker Art Museum (Sacramento): $5-million from Mort and Marcy Friedman, owners of Arden Fair Mall Associates, a real-estate company in Sacramento, for the museum’s capital campaign to help expand its facilities. The Friedmans are also co-chairs of the campaign.

Dakota State U. (Madison, S.D.): $1.2-million from the estate of Frederick Herman (Fritz) Kreuger, a farmer in Madison and a retired Air Force reservist, to support scholarships. Mr. Kreuger, who attended the university from 1930 to 1931, died last year at the age of 95.

Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontières (New York): $9.1-million unrestricted gift from Bill Gross, co-founder and chief investment officer of Pimco, a bond-management firm in Newport Beach, Calif., and his wife, Sue. The gift comprises the proceeds from the sale of part of Mr. Gross’s stamp collection.

Foundation of the U. of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey (New Brunswick): $1-million from Gary Grover, director of pharmacology at Eurofins, a biotechnology company in Dayton, N.J., and his wife, Janis, director of marketing at BRI-AL, a gourmet-food importer in Morristown, N.J., to endow a professorship in physiology and biophysics at the university’s Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. Mr. Grover is also an adjunct professor at the medical school.

Hobart and William Smith Colleges (Geneva, N.Y.): $3.7-million pledge from James F. Caird, founder of Auto Insurance Specialists, in Manhattan Beach, Calif., and his wife, Cynthia, for the capital campaign. Mr. Caird graduated from Hobart in 1956 with a bachelor’s degree in American history.

John Carroll U. (University Heights, Ohio): $2.5-million from John Boler, founder and chairman of the Boler Company, a commercial-vehicle parts supplier in Itasca, Ill., and his wife, Mary Jo, to establish a discretionary fund for the university’s president; $2.5-million from Jack Breen, retired chief executive officer of the Sherwin-Williams Company, a paint manufacturer and distributor in Cleveland, and his wife, Mary Jane, to endow a chair in Catholic systematic theology; and $1-million from Barbara Schubert, retired associate director of the Ohio Ballet, in Akron, and her husband, John, to support programs that focus on the university’s mission. Several of the donors are alumni of John Carroll: Mr. Boler and Mr. Breen both graduated in 1956, Ms. Breen earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in 1991 and 1994, respectively, and Ms. Schubert received her bachelor’s degree in 1962, as well as two graduate degrees from the university.

Kenyon College (Gambier, Ohio): $5-million pledge from Phillip Currier, retired chief executive officer of Sara Lee Knit Products, in Winston-Salem, N.C., and his wife, Jane, to endow scholarships; $2-million pledge from Edwin H. Eaton Jr., retired vice president and comptroller of Procter & Gamble, in Cincinnati, and his family to endow a professorship in anthropology; and $2-million from Barrett A. Toan, retired chairman of Express Scripts, a mail-order prescription company in St. Louis, and his wife, Polly O’Brien, to endow scholarships.

Local Initiatives Support Corporation (New York): $5-million from Lisa Cashin, the organization’s chief loan underwriter, and her husband, Dick, managing partner of One Equity Partners, the private-equity branch of JPMorgan Chase, in New York. The gift is earmarked for general operating support and to provide community-development internships at LISC for 10 students from Prep for Prep, a local nonprofit group.

Nature Conservancy (Arlington, Va.): $2-million challenge gift from Joyce Wood, a principal at Wood & Associates, a management-consulting firm in Bonne Terre, Mo., and her husband, Howard, chairman of Cequel III, a cable-television and communication-towers company in St. Louis, to help conserve 16,000 acres of the Current River watershed in the Missouri Ozarks mountain range.

Ohio Northern U. (Ada): $3-million bequest from the estate of Eugene A. Beeler, founding partner of Howard & Beeler, an accounting firm in Lima, Ohio, to endow the university’s general fund, the college of business administration, and student aid. Mr. Beeler, who died last year, graduated from the university in 1949 with a bachelor’s degree in accounting.

Orange County Performing Arts Center (Costa Mesa, Calif.): $4-million from Jane Driscoll, co-founder and managing director of Pacific Alternative Asset Management Company, a hedge-fund investment firm in Irvine, Calif., and her husband, Jim, for its capital campaign. Last year the Driscolls gave $1-million toward the campaign.

Oregon State U. (Corvallis): $8-million challenge gift from Hallie Ford, a former elementary-school teacher and co-founder of Roseburg Forest Products, a lumber and building-materials manufacturer in Dillard, Ore., to help build the Center for Healthy Children and Families and to recruit a director for the new institution. Ms. Ford made the donation to the university shortly before she died on June 4 at the age of 102.

Regis U. (Denver): $9.5-million from Leonard Pomponio, former owner and operator of a shopping center in North Denver, and his sister, Rosemarie, a retired teacher in Denver, to renovate a science building. Mr. Pomponio attended Regis in the early 1950s. Ms. Pomponio died in March at age 87.

Saint Joseph Academy (Cleveland): $1.2-million bequest from Martha A. Horvath, whose father owned a cleaning-supply company in Cleveland, to endow scholarships. Ms. Horvath died last year at age 78.

U. of California at San Francisco: $1.2-million bequest from Alice Betts, who died last year at the age of 89, to support Alzheimer’s-disease research and the study and treatment of arthritis.

U. of Iowa Foundation (Iowa City): $2-million pledge from Marvin A. Pomerantz, founder and chief executive officer of the Mid-America Group, a real-estate investment and development company in West Des Moines, to endow a professorship in ophthalmology. Mr. Pomerantz graduated from the university in 1952 with a bachelor’s degree in business.

U. of Michigan Health System (Ann Arbor): $5-million from A. Alfred Taubman, founder of Taubman Centers, a mall- and retail-design company in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., to support the research of Eva Feldman on Lou Gehrig’s disease.

U. of Rhode Island (Kingston): $1-million challenge gift from an anonymous donor to endow a professorship in electrical engineering. The donor will match gifts of $10,000, $25,000, $50,000, and above from other donors.

Vanderbilt Divinity School (Nashville): $2.9-million from Cal Turner Jr., chairman of the Cal Turner Family Foundation, in Nashville, and retired chairman of Dollar General, a chain of discount-retail stores based in Goodlettsville, Tenn. Mr. Turner has stipulated that his gift be used to endow fellowships for students who intend to become ministers in the United Methodist Church and to support continuing-education programs for clergy and lay leaders.

The Zoological Society of San Diego: $2-million pledge from Audrey Geisel, widow of Theodor Geisel, author of the “Dr. Seuss” children’s books, to build a walkway in the zoo’s new Elephant Odyssey exhibit complex. Ms. Geisel is president of Dr. Seuss Enterprises and the Dr. Seuss Foundation, both in La Jolla, Calif.

— Compiled by Anne W. Howard

To submit announcements of donations from individuals of $1-million or more, please send an e-mail message to gifts@philanthropy.com.