Trustee donates $16 million to the University Museum

Penn alumnus and archaeologist Charles Williams II donated $16 million to the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology yesterday. The gift is earmarked to bring air conditioning to the Victorian-era museum -- a modern convenience that most of the building currently lacks. Williams' donation was formally announced at a reception in the Egyptian gallery of the museum last night before a crowd of University Trustees, administrators and faculty. According to University President Judith Rodin, the gift to the museum -- a showpiece of the University -- is especially welcome. Rodin said that she has taken several visiting foreign dignitaries -- as well as VIPs in town for the Republican National Convention last summer -- through the collections. "They were thrilled to see the representation of their various cultures," Rodin said. Williams lauded the museum as one of the best of its kind, but stressed that it needed to be modernized. "It's as remarkable today as it was [when it was first built], but it needs to be updated," he commented. Rodin also noted that she uses the museum as a personal refuge when things in the office get too hectic. "When I'm low, or the days are too hard, I sneak over to the museum," Rodin said. "It renews me." The donation comes just weeks after Trustee George Weiss gave $20 million for financial aid, a technology hub and an endowed professorship. And the museum itself has been garnering impressive contributions in recent years, with Margaret and Bruce Mainwaring giving $17 million for the new Mainwaring Wing less than a year ago. Williams will chair a new fundraising committee that aims to raise $55 million for the museum. His gift marks the beginning of the program, which has been dubbed "The 21st Century Campaign: Preserving the Past, Endowing the Future." Williams received his undergraduate degree at Princeton University in 1953, and also received a Masters of Fine Arts in Architecture from Princeton in 1956. He came to Penn in the 1970s and received his doctorate in Classical Archaeology in 1978. Williams has studied a variety of topics in history throughout his career, including Mycanean Greece, ancient Rome and the Fourth Crusade of the Middle Ages. According to Williams, his love for classical history prompted him to make such a large gift. "I found [the museum] fascinating when I was a graduate student," he explained. In a statement, Rodin said that the donation is an illustration of Williams' commitment to history and archaeology. "His gift... is a further demonstration of his vision and his determination to ensure that the Museum remains among a handful of preeminent archaeological and anthropological museums nationwide, and in fact, throughout the world," she said in the statement. After Williams spoke last night, Rodin thanked major contributors to the museum contributors, with the Marinwarings and Williams at the top of the list, but encouraged the Trustees in the audience to give more. "Here is what I look forward to," she told the Trustees. "Standing here five years from now and reading an incredibly long list of donors." Museum Director Jeremy Sabloff echoed Rodin's words, saying that while the museum is highly successful, the University cannot stop improving it. "We cannot rest on our laurels," he said. The fundraising campaign seeks to find donors for several key projects at the museum. These include $26 million for the refurbishing and air conditioning of the facility, $11 million for field and research projects and $18 million for collections and outreach. As part of the fundraising campaign, several opportunities for naming positions and places in honor of givers are available, ranging from a $5 million traveling exhibition gallery to an inscribed brick in the garden for $5,000. Before the speeches in the Egyptian gallery, the audience gathered in the museum's rotunda for cocktails and hors d'oeuvres.