Recent Gifts to the Library

In each issue of the newsletter we like to highlight some of the special gifts that we have recently received. Because the University's capital campaign ended on December 31, 2000, there was a final rush of gifts to complete the campaign, many of them directed to the Library. So, for this edition, we are listing more individual gifts than we normally do.

Once again, the Library acknowledges with pleasure the generosity of its friends--all of them.

The Claire Giannini Fund has made a generous grant to support the Giannini Collection at the Bancroft Library. The first installment will fund the creation of specific plans relating to the design of facilities and resources for the Giannini Collection at the Library. The collection focuses on the rich history of the Giannini family in San Francisco and on the business, political, philanthropic, and social activities of Claire Giannini Hoffman, the daughter of A. P. Giannini, who took a small North Beach bank, the Bank of Italy, and developed it into the Bank of America.

Philip Sheuerman '77, a member of the Metropolitan Washington Campaign Committee, has pledged a five-year gift to support library preservation. In addition, his mother, Rebecca Sheuerman, recently supported the Library Fund with a gift honoring her late husband, Arnold A. Sheuerman '44, M.D. '46.

Cal's Class of 1999 voted to designate its senior class gift to the University Library Acquisitions Fund, the income of which will assist the Library in purchasing books, journals, and other materials. The Class of 1999 joins with good company, as the Classes of 1998 and 1997 also designated the Library for their class gifts.

Naomi Edwards Held recognized the importance of private support in maintaining the Library's world-class collections with a bequest designated for acquisitions.

The Library received two gifts from alumni in Southern California. Nancy Hult Ganis '78, M.J. '81, a member of the UC Berkeley Foundation, made a five-year pledge to provide unrestricted support to the Library. Charles F. Palmer '69 completed the generous pledge that he made in 1998 for the Arts and Humanities Collections Endowment.

The Ambassador Bill and Jean Lane Fund supports organization of the William Penn Mott, Sr., papers, writings, and other materials in the Bancroft Library. William Penn Mott, Jr., was one of the leading figures of the parks and recreation movement in the twentieth century. Dedicating his life to help people learn to enjoy and value parklands, during his tenure as director of the National Park Service he was responsible for establishing 12 new national parks.

Recently the Bancroft Library has received several significant bequests:

The Mary Jane Wilson '47 Memorial Endowment Fund was established to support materials on the art and history of the book, Mrs. Wilson's special interest. She was particularly fascinated with fine printing from the Bay Area, and income from the fund will provide additional materials for Bancroft's collection in that field.

Included in the will of Ruth C. Chance '27, J.D.'31, was a gift to establish the Ruth C. Chance Fund, an endowed fund that will support the Regional Oral History Office in the Bancroft Library. Since the Oral History Office receives almost no funding from the state of California, it is through the generosity and public-spiritedness of individuals like Mrs. Chance that it has been able to carry out its work of documenting the lives of individuals who have contributed to the growth of California.

The Robert M. Jones '73 Fund for the Bancroft Library was established without restrictions; in other words, income from the fund will be used wherever the need is greatest.

Bancroft received from the Estate of Donna C. Davies her library related to Welsh studies, including materials on the Welsh in Wales and the United States. Ms. Davies also provided funding to maintain the collection.

Florence Richardson Wyckoff '26 included in her will a bequest to organize the papers of Warring Wilkinson, Florence Walton Wilkinson, Maud Richardson, and other family members. Wykoff, the subject of an oral history published by Bancroft's Regional Oral History Office, came from a family with close ties to Cal. Her father, Leon J. Richardson, was a professor of classics and served as director of the extension division, and her grandfather, Warring Wilkinson, was director of the California Institute for the Deaf and Blind in Berkeley.