Technology Magnate Creates Foundation With $75-Million; Other Gifts

Seven institutions have received big gifts:

• Harvey E. Najim, president of Sirius Computer Solutions, a technology company in San Antonio, has created the Harvey E. Najim Family Foundation, in San Antonio, with a $75-million gift. The new foundation will support education, children’s medical treatment and research on diseases that affect children, and other children’s causes in the San Antonio metropolitan area.
• Marquette University, in Milwaukee, has received a pledge of $51-million from Raymond A. Eckstein, the founder of two cargo-transportation companies, and his wife, Kathryn, to build a new facility for the university’s law school. Mr. Eckstein graduated from the law school in 1949, and his wife graduated from Marquette the same year with a bachelor’s degree in speech.
• The University of Chicago has received $35-million from David Logan, an investment banker at Mercury Investment, in Chicago, his wife, Reva, a former teacher, and their family, to build its Center for Creative and Performing Arts. Ms. Logan briefly attended the undergraduate college, and Mr. Logan graduated from the university in 1939 with a bachelor’s degree, and in 1941 with a law degree.
• The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, in Cambridge, Mass., has received an unrestricted bequest of $19.5-million from Hope Bartnett Belloc to support its fellowship program, the Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, and lectures and conferences. Her father, W.J. Bartnett, was president of the Western Pacific Railroad Company, in San Francisco. Ms. Belloc, who graduated from Radcliffe College in 1920 with a bachelor’s degree, died in 1970 at the age of 74.
• The Foundation for Jewish Camping, in New York, has received a pledge of $15-million from an anonymous businessman to expand opportunities for children to attend Jewish summer camp. The donor stipulated that local Jewish organizations must raise additional support for their camping programs. The donor initially made a $1-million gift last year for camps in Chicago, but has increased the donation to enable the charity to expand its program nationally.
• San Jose State University, in California, has received $10-million from Connie L. Lurie, a former elementary-school teacher in California, to support student and faculty development and establish an independent doctoral program in educational leadership for administrators of elementary and secondary schools. Ms. Lurie, who graduated from the university in 1964 with a bachelor’s degree in elementary education and psychology, is married to Robert Lurie, chairman of the Lurie Company, a real-estate development firm in San Francisco, and a former owner of the San Francisco Giants baseball team.
• Myron E. (Mike) Ullman III, chairman of JCPenney, a department-store chain based in Plano, Tex., and his wife, Cathy, have pledged $10-million to the University of Cincinnati’s College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning. The couple has earmarked the money to endow professorships, support faculty development and technology, and pay for special classes taught by business leaders. Mr. Ullman graduated from the university’s college of business in 1969 with a bachelor’s degree in industrial management, and Ms. Ullman graduated from the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning in 1970 with a bachelor’s degree in graphic design.

Other recent gifts:

Children’s Hospital of Illinois at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center (Peoria): $5-million from Jerry Stephens, founder and chairman of RLI Inc., an insurance company in Peoria, and his wife, Helen, to support its new neonatal intensive-care unit.

Middlebury College (Vt.): $1-million from Kathryn Wasserman Davis, an international-politics scholar, to support 100 Projects for Peace, which provides grants to allow students to travel abroad for grass-roots service projects. Ms. Davis’s late husband, Shelby, was an investor and a U.S. ambassador to Switzerland. She donated this gift to celebrate her 100th birthday.

Newseum (Washington): $5-million from Robert H. Smith, chairman of Charles E. Smith Commercial Realty and Charles E. Smith Residential, real-estate development and management companies based in Arlington, Va., and his wife, Clarice, an artist. The donors have asked that their gift help build the museum’s Big Screen Theater, which will show historic newscasts, original documentaries, and breaking news stories. The Newseum is scheduled to open in October.

Northwest College Foundation (Powell, Wyo.): $1-million bequest from Wilma Nielsen and her brother Ed Wilcken, both retired farmers from Davenport, Iowa, to endow scholarships for students who need financial aid. Ms. Nielsen died last year at age 96; her brother died in 2001 at the age of 89.

Pheasants Forever (St. Paul): $1-million from Tobias Buck, chairman of Paragon Medical, a medical-supply manufacturer in Pierceton, Ind., to support its youth and education programs. Mr. Buck serves on the organization’s Board of Directors.

Ringling College of Art and Design (Sarasota, Fla.): $4-million pledge from Ulla Searing, widow of Arthur Searing, who was vice president of finance at the American International Group, an insurance company headquartered in New York. Ms. Searing, 94, has stipulated that the college will receive the gift upon her death; half will support scholarships, and the other $2-million is unrestricted.

Santa Clara U. (Calif.): $1-million from Katharine Alexander, a former public defender in Santa Clara County, and her husband, George, professor emeritus of law and retired director of the Institute of International and Comparative Law, to establish a prize at the university’s school of law. The award will be given to a person who has used their law education to alleviate injustice or inequality.

Stanford U. School of Medicine (Calif.): $4-million from Paul Berg, a biochemist and professor emeritus of cancer research at Stanford, and his wife, Millie, to help build the Learning and Knowledge Center. Mr. Berg is a co-chair of the campaign to raise $50-million for the new facility.

Stoneleigh-Burnham School (Greenfield, Mass.): $1-million from an anonymous donor to expand its middle-school facilities.

U. of Alaska (Fairbanks): $2.6-million unrestricted gift from Ronald F. Cosgrave, an investor and former chairman of Alaska Airlines, which is based in Seattle. The university purchased 30 acres of land in Fairbanks with the gift. Mr. Cosgrave graduated from the university in 1958 with a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering.

U. of Rochester, School of Medicine and Dentistry (N.Y.): $5-million from John Wallis Rowe, former chief executive officer of Aetna, an insurance company in Hartford, Conn., for its capital campaign. Dr. Rowe graduated from the medical school in 1970.

U. of Wisconsin at Madison: $2-million from Don Hedberg, co-founder and retired co-owner of Lab Safety Supply, an industrial and safety-equipment manufacturer in Janesville, Wis., to support its new HealthEmotions Research Institute Building. The institute studies mental illness, brain function, and emotional states.

U. of Wyoming (Laramie): $1-million from Marian Rochelle and her daughter, April Brimmer Kunz, to support the university’s College of Law. The gift is given in honor of Ms. Rochelle’s late husband, William N. Brimmer, a 1938 alumnus of the U. of Wyoming and a lawyer in Cheyenne, Wyo. Ms. Kunz, who received her law degree from the university in 1979, is a lawyer in Cheyenne and a former state senator.

Virginia Commonwealth U. (Richmond): $3.8-million from Michelle Romano, a family physician in Fairfax, Va., and her husband, Don, a retired hospital administrator in Washington. They have earmarked the money to support the school of nursing, endow scholarships at the medical school and in health administration, and endow professorships in family medicine and health administration. Dr. Romano graduated from the university’s medical school in 1984, and Mr. Romano graduated from Virginia Commonwealth in 1973 with a master’s degree in health administration. The school of nursing also received a pledge of $1-million from Helen Birch, a retired nurse at the Polk County Eye Clinic, in Lakeland, Va., to endow scholarships. Ms. Birch graduated from the nursing school in 1947.

Yale U. Press (New Haven, Conn.): $3-million from Cecile Margellos, a literary translator and specialist in 16th-century French literature, and her husband, Theodore, managing director and co-founder of the Ilta Group, a private-equity firm in Cairo, to endow a fund for a publishing series of foreign-literature translations. The couple’s daughter, Iliodora, graduated from Yale last year.

— Compiled by Anne W. Howard