Donor Pledges $70-Million to Oral Roberts University; Other Gifts

Eight institutions have received big gifts:

• Oral Roberts University, in Tulsa, Okla., has received a pledge of $70-million from Mart Green, founder of Mardel Christian and Educational Supply, in Oklahoma City. Mr. Green has already given the institution $8-million, and will donate the remainder if he satisfied with the university’s performance after a 90-day review of its finances and governance. The university has faced lawsuits and other challenges over alleged misspending by its former president. Mr. Green’s family founded Hobby Lobby, a chain of craft stores headquartered in Oklahoma City.
• The University of Pittsburgh’s School of Engineering has received $32.5-million from John A. Swanson, founder and retired chief technologist of Ansys, a software and technology company in Canonsburg, Pa., to renovate and expand its facilities; endow professorships, scholarships, fellowships, and a discretionary fund for the Swanson Institute of Technical Excellence; and provide unrestricted support. Mr. Swanson received his doctorate in applied mechanics from the university in 1966.
• Jon M. Huntsman Sr., founder of the Huntsman Corporation, which makes chemicals for adhesives, aerospace equipment, electronics, paints, and other products, in Salt Lake City, and his wife, Karen, have pledged $26-million to Utah State University, in Logan. The Huntsmans have directed $25-million of the gift to support the School of Business, and the remaining $1-million will support scholarships for Armenian students at Utah State. Their previous donations to the university have supported the Huntsman Environmental Research Center and the David B. Haight Alumni Center. Mr. and Mrs. Huntsman said they have not yet determined how much of this gift will come through their foundation.
• The Aspen Music Festival and School, in Colorado, has received $25-million from Matthew Bucksbaum, co-founder and chairman emeritus of General Growth Properties, a real-estate investment and management company in Chicago, and his wife, Kay, to help build a new campus and to support programs there. Mr. Bucksbaum is a trustee of the organization.
• The Viterbi School of Engineering at the University of Southern California, in Los Angeles, has received $17-million from Sonny Astani, chairman of Astani Enterprises, a real-estate development company in Beverly Hills, Calif., to support the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Mr. Astani, who graduated from the university in 1978 with a master’s degree in industrial and systems engineering, wants his gift to nurture the department’s research on the challenges faced by engineers with the emergence of “megacities” of more than 10 million people.
• Donald Diamond, owner of Diamond Ventures, a real-estate and land-development firm in Tucson, and his wife, Joan, have donated $15-million to the University Medical Center, in Tucson, to build a new children’s hospital. The new facility will include 116 beds and is scheduled for completion in 2010.
• Louise Rossi, whose family ran a vineyard in Rutherford, Calif., has bequeathed $12.5-million to the University of California at Davis for viticultural research. The university will use her gift to purchase equipment for the Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science, create at least one professorship, and endow research on improving the production and flavor of grapes and wine. Ms. Rossi, who died in February at the age of 99, also worked as a bookkeeper for the B.L. Taylor Electric Company, in St. Helena, Calif. This gift comes from the sale of Ms. Rossi’s ranch earlier this year.
• Washington University in St. Louis has received $10-million from Harry Seigle, founder and principal of the Elgin Company, a real-estate acquisition and investment firm in Chicago, and his wife, Susan. The couple earmarked their donation for a building that will be used by three social-science departments and the School of Law. Mr. Seigle graduated from the university in 1968 with a bachelor’s degree in political science.

Other recent gifts:

East Texas Medical Center Foundation (Tyler): $3-million pledge from Bo Pilgrim, co-founder and senior chairman of Pilgrim’s Pride, a poultry company based in Pittsburg, Tex., and his wife, Patty, to help build a fitness, rehabilitation, and physical-therapy center at a new medical facility.

Grand Rapids Community Foundation (Mich.): $1-million from Tom Fox, former owner of Fox Jewelers, a chain of 44 stores based in Grand Rapids that he sold in 1997, and his wife, Mickie, to help buy a new building that will serve as the foundation’s headquarters.

Greater Salina Community Foundation (Kan.): $4.9-million bequest from the estate of L.P. (Pat) Mullen, a scientist and inventor in Salina. Of the bequest, $2.4-million will augment the endowment of the Sacred Heart Jr./Sr. High School, in Salina, and $1.2-million will provide unrestricted support to the Sisters of St. Joseph Nazareth Academy, an order of Catholic nuns in Concordia, Kan. The remainder of the gift will go to the community foundation for education programs in the arts, humanities, invention, science, and technology. Mr. Mullen, who died in 2006 at the age of 69, was founder and owner of Scientific Engineering, in Salina.

Hoag Memorial Hospital Foundation (Newport Beach, Calif.): $1-million from Dick Allen, president of DIMA Ventures, a venture-capital firm in Irvine, Calif., and his wife, Mary, for its capital campaign to establish a diabetes center. The Allens’ granddaughter, Hannah, has type I diabetes.

Jamestown Community College Foundation (Olean, N.Y.): $1-million from an anonymous donor to endow scholarships and academic programs.

Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital at University Hospitals (Cleveland): $2-million from James W. Brown, chairman of Hartzell Properties, in Piqua, Ohio, and his wife, Connie, to endow a professorship in pediatric pulmonary survivorship and help build a new clinical and research space for cystic fibrosis. The couple’s granddaughter was treated for cystic fibrosis at the hospital.

Texas Tech U. Health Sciences Center at El Paso: $1.5-million from Peter R. Mounsey, a lawyer and chief executive officer of MAK-J Energy Operating Company, an oil- and gas-exploration company in Denver, and his wife, Anne, former manager of marketing and business development at Markwest Hydrocarbon, in Denver, to endow a professorship in pediatric surgery. The donation is made in honor of Donald E. Meier, a surgeon who operated on the couple’s infant son, Peter.

U. of California at Santa Barbara: $3-million from William K. Bowes Jr., a founding shareholder and former chairman of Amgen, a drug-research and manufacturing company in Thousand Oaks, Calif., to endow the director’s position for the planned Center for Stem Cell Biology and Engineering. Mr. Bowes gave the money in honor of his late mother, Ruth Garland, who was a physician in San Francisco.

U. of Dayton (Ohio): $5.6-million from an anonymous donor to renovate the Immaculate Conception Chapel, and $5-million from another anonymous donor, who is a graduate of the university, to endow scholarships for the children, grandchildren, nieces, and nephews of Catholic deacons.

U. of Illinois Foundation (Urbana): $1.1-million bequest from the estate of Margaret Wepner, a retired executive secretary in the Illinois state government who died in 2005 at the age of 91, to endow a professorship in political science, a faculty-excellence award, and scholarships. The U. of Illinois Foundation also received a pledge of $1-million from Donald Harper, retired chairman of Insilco, a silver-products manufacturing company in Meriden, Conn., and his wife, Nancy, for unrestricted support of the College of Business. Mr. Harper graduated from the university in 1950 with a bachelor’s degree in business and journalism. Additionally, the foundation received $1-million from William Kaufman, a retired surgeon in Allen Park, Mich., and his wife, Carole, to endow scholarships for needy medical students. Dr. Kaufman received his M.D. from the U. of Illinois in 1951.

U. of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: $2-million pledge from William G. Allen, founder and president of Waterfront Development Services, a real-estate development company in Charlotte, N.C., to support the school’s sales program at the Kenan-Flagler Business School. The gift will enable the school to hire a professor and an administrator to develop and manage guest-speaker and sales-training programs. The university also received $1-million from Russell M. (Rusty) Carter, Velda Carter Hughes, and Linda Carter Metzger. Their father, W. Horace Carter, is an alumnus and newspaper publisher who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for a media campaign against the Ku Klux Klan. The donation will endow a professorship in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

U. of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine, New Bolton Center (Kennett Square): $1-million from John K. Castle, chief executive officer of Castle Harlan, a private-equity investment firm in New York, and his wife, Marianne, to support research into laminitis, a foot disease that affects horses and cattle.

U. of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts (Los Angeles): $2-million from Hugh M. Hefner, founder and editor in chief of Playboy magazine, for its central exhibition space and an archival repository for student films, production-related records, and other materials. Mr. Hefner donated $1.5-million in 1995 to endow a professorship in American film.

University Hospitals (Cleveland): $1.5-million from Morton A. Cohen, chairman of Clarion Capital, an investment firm in Cleveland, and his wife, Rosalie, to endow a professorship in lung cancer. Ms. Cohen was treated for cancer at University Hospitals.

Wake Forest U. (Winston-Salem, N.C.): $7-million bequest from the estate of Ralph Wingate Bland, a surgeon in Goldsboro, N.C., to support scholarships at both the School of Law and the School of Medicine. Mr. Bland, who died in 2006, graduated from Wake Forest in 1948 with a bachelor’s degree and in 1952 with a medical degree.

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