University Gets $45-Million Pledge; Other Gifts

Five organizations have received large gifts or pledges:

• The University of South Carolina at Columbia has announced a $45-million pledge from Darla Moore, executive vice president of Rainwater, an investment company in Fort Worth, for endowed professorships, renovations, and scholarships at the school of business. Ms. Moore said she would provide $15-million after the university matches that sum with financing from other sources; the university will have to raise an additional $30-million from private sources to get the rest of the gift. Ms. Moore, who grew up in Lake City, S.C., is a trustee of the university, and gave the business school $25-million in 1998.
• The Dallas Center for thePerforming Arts Foundation has received $20-million from Charles Wyly; his wife, Dee; and his brother, Sam, for a theater at this new center, which is expected to be completed by 2009. Charles and Sam Wyly founded Michaels Stores, in Irving, Tex.
• The Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles has received a $12-million bequest from Werner and Ellen Lange to endow its programs. Mr. Lange, who was born in Germany and emigrated to the United States in the 1930s, founded an optical-instruments company in Los Angeles. He died in 2003; his wife died in 2000.
• Harvard University, in Cambridge, Mass., has received $10-million from Mortimer B. Zuckerman, who attended Harvard Law School in 1962, to establish a graduate fellowship program. Mr. Zuckerman founded Boston Properties, a real-estate firm, and also owns several publications, including The New York Daily News and U.S. News & World Report.
• Mills College, in Oakland, Calif., has received a $10-million pledge from Lorry I. Lokey, founder and chief executive officer of Business Wire, in San Francisco, to create a graduate business school that will prepare women for entrepreneurial careers.

Other recent gifts:

Birmingham-Southern College (Birmingham, Ala.): $5.8-million bequest from Archibald S. Brown, a businessman in Birmingham, for scholarships and unrestricted use.

Central Missouri State U. (Warrensburg): Bequest of approximately $2-million from Voncile Bowen Huffman, a 1942 graduate and a former teacher and school administrator in Denver, for scholarships.

McDaniel College (Westminster, Md.): Bequest of approximately $3.5-million from Katherine Leidy Unger, a high-school English teacher and a 1932 graduate of the college, for the Hoover Library.

Pennsylvania State U. (University Park): $1-million from Dorothy Foehr Huck and her husband, J. Lloyd, a retired chairman of the board of Merck & Company (Whitehouse Station, N.J.), for a new building for the college of business. The Hucks graduated from Penn State in 1943.

Pitzer College (Claremont, Calif.): $5-million from Ann, Russ, and John Pitzer, grandchildren of the college’s founder, and $3-million from Gloria Gold and her husband, Peter, former president and chairman of Price Pfister (Foothill Ranch, Calif.), for new residence halls.

U. of Texas at Austin: $1-million unrestricted gift from Joe Jamail, a lawyer in Houston and a graduate of the university, for the law school.

Wayland Academy (Beaver Dam, Wis.): $1.2-million bequest from Harry M. Newton, an 1890 graduate of the school who died in 1953 at age 84, to endow a scholarship fund.