Office of News and Information
Johns Hopkins University / 3400 N. Charles Street
Baltimore, Maryland 21218-2692
Phone: (410) 516-7160 / Fax (410) 516-5251
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November 22, 1999
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Dennis O'Shea
dro@jhu.edu
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Texas Businessman Ralph O'Connor
Commits $3 Million to Hopkins
Houston investment executive Ralph S. O'Connor has pledged
$3 million to his
alma mater, The Johns Hopkins University, for its current fund-raising campaign.
Of the total gift, $2.775 million will support construction
of a student recreation
center at the university's Homewood campus. The remaining
$225,000 will be added to
the endowment of the Ralph S. O'Connor Scholarship, which he
established in 1993 to
assist undergraduates in the Krieger School of
Arts and
Sciences.
A 1951 biology graduate of Hopkins, O'Connor served on the
university's board
of trustees from 1969 to 1975 and in 1981 received the university
President's Medal for
exemplary service.
The focus in O'Connor's new gift on student financial aid
and on an important
facilities project reflects two of the priorities in the
remaining months of the Johns
Hopkins Initiative, a campaign that was launched in 1994.
"Ralph O'Connor's magnificent gift will help bring the best
students to
Homewood and help provide them with a much-needed new recreation
center," said
William R. Brody, president of the
university. "Future
generations of undergraduates will be most grateful for his
generosity."
A design is being finalized for the recreation center,
expected to open in fall 2001.
It will contain a field house with courts for basketball,
volleyball and racquetball; an
indoor track; a climbing wall; a fitness center; and flexible
multipurpose spaces.
"To keep competitive, a school needs to have what the
students want," O'Connor
said of the recreation center. "Not everyone can play varsity
sports, and this facility will
provide superb space for intramural and informal competitions.
Such activities make
better students and better
people."
Ralph O'Connor is chairman, chief executive officer and
president of an
investment firm that carries his name. From 1964 to 1987, he was
president of Highland
Resources.
A veteran of the Army Air Force and a graduate of the
Harvard Business School
Advanced Management Program, O'Connor is known for civic,
business, and
philanthropic endeavors. He has served as a director of the
American Petroleum
Institute, as chairman of the board of Oldfields School in
Maryland, and as a trustee of
Rice University and of the National Foundation for the
Advancement of the Arts.
He is a director of Highland Coors Distributing Co. and
chairman of Skadium
Enterprises Inc. He was among the original partners who acquired
the NBA's San Diego
Rockets and brought them to Houston to become the Houston
Rockets.
O'Connor is chairman and president of the Marian and Speros
Martel Foundation
of Houston. He is also a member of the President's Circle of the
National Academy of
Sciences, National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of
Medicine.
He is past president of the Houston Association of Petroleum
Landmen and a
member of All-American Wildcatters.
The Johns Hopkins Initiative
surpassed its expanded
goal of $1.2 billion in May 1999, more than a year before its
scheduled end. Total
commitments as of Nov. 1 were $1.324 billion. Priorities from now
until the end of the
campaign in June 2000, include support for student aid, libraries
and critical
facilities.
Johns Hopkins University news releases can be found on the
World Wide Web at
http://www.jhu.edu/news_info/news/
Information on automatic e-mail delivery
of science and medical news releases is available at the
same address.
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