Honorable Mentions211 other known gifts of more than $1 million in 1997

170. PRISCILLA BULLITT COLLINS–$1.5 million to VASSAR COLLEGE (N.Y.) for environmental-science programs from this member of the Class of 1942. $500,000 will be used for field trips, $750,000 for internships, $208,000 for equipment, and $42,000 for curricula. The gifts bring the donor’s total contributions to environmental-science programs at Vassar to $6.5 million.



170. MICHAEL J. CUDAHY–$1.5 million to JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY (Md.) for a professorship in cardiology.



170. THEODORE DRUGAS–$1.5 million to the UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT CHICAGO College of Medicine for a chair in general surgery from this retired surgeon and his wife.



170. ELLEN D. FOSTER–$1.5 million to the UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT PEORIA College of Medicine for a chair in family and community practice, from this Peoria Heights resident. Foster’s late husband, Thomas, co-founded a direct-marketing company.



170. DOLLIE GALTER–$1.5 million to LUTHERAN GENERAL HOSPITAL/ADVOCATE HEALTH CARE in Park Ridge, Ill., to renovate the neonatal intensive-care unit. Galter’s late husband, Jack, was a clock manufacturer and real-estate developer who, as a young man, played drums with Benny Goodman, Danny Alvin, and other noted jazz musicians. Dollie Galter was a Western Union manager/operator.



170. ARTHUR H. GONZALES–$1.5 million to the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN COLORADO to support the baseball program, from the retired founder of the Mountain States Sheet Metal Co.



170. LEONA M. HELMSLEY–Up to $1.5 million to the BURNED CHURCHES FUND (New York City). “It’s a good cause, it’s a good cause,” she said of the group, which was established in May 1996 by the National Council of Churches after a wave of suspected arsons gutted almost 40 churches, mostly serving African-American congregations, in the South. Helmsley noted that the burning of a church could affect people even more deeply than the loss of a home. She has promised the organization $1 million and will add $500,000 if the money is matched by other sources. Helmsley is vice president and a trustee of the Harry B. Helmsley Foundation Inc. (N.Y.)



170. BILL HUDSON JR.–A former cotton plantation valued at $1.5 million to WILLIAM CAREY COLLEGE (Miss.) for a center for fine arts, spiritual retreats, and fund-raising events, from the president of Hudson Salvage in Lumberton, Miss. The gift is the largest in the college’s history.



170. THE IRMAS FAMILY–$1.5million to the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA Law School to establish the Sydney M. Irmas Chair in Public Interest Law and Legal Ethics. The gift, made through the Audrey and Sydney Irmas Charitable Foundation, endows a chair honoring the late Los Angeles trial attorney, Sydney M. Irmas, a well-known Southern California philanthropist and an alumnus of the school. The gift was made with the participation of the Irmas’ children, DEBORAH, ROBERT, and MATTHEW, who also serve as foundation trustees. AUDREY IRMAS, who co-founded the foundation in 1983, is president and chair-elect of the board of the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art and past chair of the Los Angeles Family Housing Corp., an organization that shelters 2,000 homeless people each night and builds or rehabilitates housing for low-income families.



170. JAMES A. JOHNSON–$1.5 million to the BROOKINGS INSTITUTION (Washington, D.C.) to establish a chair in urban and metropolitan policy, from the chairman and CEO of the Federal National Mortgage Association.