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Alma Mater of Late Pennsylvania Industrialist’s Parents Gets $25-Million Bequest

Thiel College is the latest western Pennsylvania educational or cultural entity to benefit from William S. Dietrich II’s estate, announcing on Thursday a $25-million gift from the late steel magnate, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review writes.
 
The donation is the largest in the 145-year history of the small Greenville, Pa., college, from which Mr. Dietrich’s parents graduated. Nearly matching Thiel’s annual budget and exceeding its endowment, the gift “has the potential to fundamentally change” the school, said its president, Troy VanAken.
 
Mr. Dietrich, who died last month at age 73, was the chairman of Dietrich Industries, a leading maker of steel construction materials. In the weeks before his death, he bestowed a combined $390-million on Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh, and since he died several Pittsburgh-area colleges and cultural groups have received smaller gifts.

The Chronicle of Philanthropy, November 4, 2011