The Philanthropy 50 2009 Gift Profile: Dolores Jordan

Dolores Jordan: $52-million

Biggest beneficiary: Ag One Foundation

Other key beneficiaries: Children’s Hospital & Research Center Oakland and St. Rose Hospital

Donor’s background: Mrs. Jordan’s wealth comes primarily from the recent sale of her family’s Four Bar J cattle ranch, in Dublin, Calif. She and her late husband, Hanabul (Bud) Jordan, also owned the FL Construction company, in Hayward, Calif.

Mrs. Jordan, 81, gave $29.4-million in cash to the Ag One Foundation, which supports California State University at Fresno’s College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology. Of that total, $20-million will be used to construct the college’s new building, and the remaining $9.4-million will endow research programs within the college, which has been named for the Jordan family.

When she gave the donation, Mrs. Jordan stipulated that it was her husband’s wish that the money go toward those two purposes. Mr. Jordan died in 2002.

Neither one of the Jordans attended the university. Instead, they learned about it through one of the GMC motorhome rallies they frequently attended, where they met and became friends with fellow motorhome enthusiasts, Bob and Dorothy Glim. At one such rally in the late 1980s, Mr. Glim, a retired professor of agricultural economics at the college and an adviser to Ag One, gave a talk about the university’s agricultural program and shared some of the produce grown on the university’s farm. Inspired by what he heard that day, Mr. Jordan began to learn more about the university and, in 1995, handed Mr. Glim a check for $20,000 made out to the Ag One Foundation.

Despite that donation, the Jordans had never set foot on the agricultural college’s campus or on its farm, but between their construction work in the primarily agricultural area of California, and Mr. Jordan’s brother Lowell’s work on the cattle ranch the three owned, the Jordans were well aware of the importance of farming. From that point on, Dolores, Hanabul, and Lowell Jordan, who died in 2005, began donating to the college. Before this most recent gift, the three had given a total of $130,000 to the institution.

In addition, Mrs. Jordan gave $9.8-million apiece to Children’s Hospital & Research Center Oakland, in Calif., and St. Rose Hospital, in Hayward, Calif.; and $1-million each to the Alzheimer’s Association, in Chicago; the American Cancer Society, in Atlanta; and the American Heart Association, in Dallas.

—Maria Di Mento

View more profiles of donors who gave the most in 2009.