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One trillionaire fires his lowly employee over a photo, and one is devoted to peace.

Kroc left a fortune to USD institute



$50 million bequest to further peace goal

By Lisa Petrillo
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

November 5, 2003

As dying philanthropist Joan Kroc sat in her Rancho Santa Fe living room talking about her legacy, she spoke about the $50 million she was leaving University of San Diego's Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice.

" 'Now they will know I'm serious about peace,' " Mrs. Kroc told center director Joyce Neu.

Yesterday the university announced Mrs. Kroc's bequest, the largest in its history, to the center which she had supported with $30 million in donations over the last five years.

"This will allow USD to become a diamond in the field," Neu said of Mrs. Kroc's last gift to the 7,000-student university.

The McDonald's heiress and philanthropist died Oct. 12 of brain cancer at age 75. She left a $1.7 billion estate, and of the numerous gifts to charities as diverse as the homeless and sick children, Kroc left $100 million toward the cause of world peace.

Last week came the news that she had donated $50 million to the University of Notre Dame's Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, the largest gift in that private university's history. But officials at the University of San Diego said they had delayed announcing their share of the bequest in deference to the suffering going on during Southern California's wildfires.

Mrs. Kroc told USD officials in August of her intentions. As she gathered beneficiaries in her living room to discuss her legacy, Neu recalled Mrs. Kroc uttering her pronouncement about being serious about peace, and everyone laughed.

"This was one of the most fun human beings you could know," she said. "Even though she was dying, she was not sad, not maudlin. I'm just grateful that I was lucky enough to know her, and to thank her."

For USD the endowment will allow the center to hire distinguished faculty, increase scholarships to graduate students from around the world, establish scholars-in-residence programs and allow the center to become more actively involved in public policy globally.

Already, the university has had calls from politically troubled regions such as Nepal, Macedonia and Chechnya to become part of their peace process, Neu said, but lack of resources has hampered more active involvement.

"This takes us to a whole new level. We are the place that people will come to, not just doing the research but doing the work out in the field, to make the world a better place," Neu said.

"Staggering" is the word USD president Mary Lyons uses to describe the donation that she believes will define what she calls the "new Catholic university."

Both Notre Dame and USD are private, Catholic universities.

USD will not just host a center devoted to peace and social justice but will be able to act and spread Catholic ideals, Lyons said. "The university itself will be an institution that goes to the heart and soul of the teachings of the church."

Although the Notre Dame center is more than a decade older than the one at USD, Neu believes Mrs. Kroc's gift is an endorsement of the direction Neu was taking the center. Its students come from countries as far away as Kenya, Korea, Iran, Tanzania and Nepal. The center has hosted ambassadors from such regions as Macedonia and the Congo, and drawn such notables as former President Jimmy Carter, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

"She was very much against the use of military force to resolve conflicts," said Neu, who noted that Mrs. Kroc both publicly and privately tried to do what she could for the cause of peace. "That is the work she would want us to carry on in her name."



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Lisa Petrillo: [phone]; [e-mail]