Radcliffe Granted $2 Million

Radcliffe College has received a $2 million gift from a foundation that will endow the chair for the Director for the Arthur Schlesginer Library, President Linda S. Wilson said last night.

The donation, one of the largest in Radcliffe's history, was given by the Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation, which was established by a Harvard-Radcliffe alumni couple.

"It's an extremely important investment in one of Radcliffe's crown jewels," Wilson said.

"The library is a unique resource for undergraduates, as well as a national treasure used by scholars across the nation," she said.

Radcliffe will use the contribution to endow the salary of the library's director--as Radcliffe prepares to celebrate the library's 50th anniversary.

The current director, Patricia King, has headed the library for the past 20 years.

"It's a real vote of confidence," King said. "It will prepare us enormously to meet the challenges of the next half century."

The gift is the most generous in a long history of Pforzheimer family's involvement with Harvard and Radcliffe.

'Close Friends'

"Members of the family have been close and attentive friends, serving many different roles," Wilson said.

The Pforzheimer Foundation was founded by Carl Pforzheimer '28 and Lily Pforzheimer '31. Other contributions from the foundation provide funding for fellowships in undergraduate research projects that use the library's resources and the purchase of books.

"The endowment of the director-ship is the greatest tribute that could be paid to the library," historian Joan R. Challinor, chair of the Schlesinger Library's Advisory Committee, said in a written statement.

"On the director's shoulders rests the choice of staff and the management of the library. Further, the director interprets the library to the academic world and to the public," Challinor said.

The Schlesinger Library was founded in 1942 when suffragist Maud Wood Park (class of 1898) donated her collection on woman's rights to Radcliffe.

The library now holds the archives of many women's organizations including the National Women's Political Caucus and the National Organization for Women, and the papers of notable women such as Susan B. Anthony, Julia Child, Amelia Earhart, Betty Friedan, and Harriet Beecher Stowe.