A roundup of notable gifts compiled by the Chronicle:
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Bruce and Martha Karsh gave $25 million through their Karsh Family Foundation to back research and treatment of digestive and liver diseases. The current Division of Digestive and Liver Diseases will be renamed the Karsh Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology in recognition of the gift.
Bruce Karsh is a former lawyer and the co-founder of Oaktree Capital Management, where he serves as chief investment officer. Martha Karsh is an attorney who founded an architecture and design firm.
The couple give to a variety of causes and appeared on the Chronicle’s annual Philanthropy 50 report of the biggest donors in 2011, when they gave $50 million to Duke University for scholarships.
University of Florida
Chris Malachowsky donated $25 million to create a powerful artificial-intelligence supercomputer and data center, and to support the development of a workforce training program. His company, NVIDIA, will donate hardware, software, training, and other services to the efforts.
Malachowsky co-founded the accelerated computing company in 1993. He earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the university in 1983 and worked for Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems before helping to start NVIDIA.
Saint Peter’s University
Thomas Mac Mahon pledged $5 million
to help renovate the Victor R. Yanitelli, S.J. Recreational Life Center. Mac Mahon’s gift will go toward the first phase of the renovation, which includes the creation of a modern basketball and volleyball arena.
Mac Mahon served from 1997 to 2006 as chairman and chief executive officer of LabCorp, a company in Burlington, N.C., that operates a network of clinical laboratories. He graduated from the university in 1968 and served on its Board of Trustees from 2012 to 2018.
Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University
Gerald and Emily Lemole pledged $5 million to establish the Lemole Center for Integrated Lymphatics Research. The new center will focus on integrated basic-science research and clinical research to target the lymphatic system in understanding, treating, and curing human disease.
Gerald Lemole is cardiac surgeon who is best known in medicine for being part of the team that performed the first heart transplant in the United States in 1968. He went on to perform the first coronary bypass in the tri-state area of Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey in 1969 and later was named chief of cardiothoracic surgery at Temple. He is also an alumnus of the medical school, earning his M.D. there in 1962.
Emily Jane Asplundh Lemole is a former commissioner of Lower Moreland Township, Pa., and a minister in the Swedenborgian Church of North America.
Prostate Cancer Foundation
Robert Smith gave $1.9 million to back a new effort aimed at reducing deaths from prostate cancer, one of the largest health disparities facing Black men today.
Smith’s gift will help pay for the research that will be key in developing the Smith Polygenic Risk Test for Prostate Cancer, a noninvasive, early-detection test that will identify a man’s lifetime prostate-cancer risk using a combination of more than 250 genetic variants obtained from a single sample of saliva or blood.
Smith founded Vista Equity Partners, a private-equity firm that is focused on software companies. He has appeared on the Chronicle’s annual Philanthropy 50 report of the biggest donors three times since 2005, most recently in 2019 when he gave $55.6 million to nonprofits that year, including roughly $34 million to help Morehouse College students pay off their education loans.
Hartford Community College Foundation
David and Alena Schwaber donated $1 million to endow a scholarship program for nursing students that they established with a gift in 2005.
David Schwaber is the retired president of Monarch Rubber in Baltimore, Md., a rubber manufacturer founded in 1928 by Schwaber’s uncle, Sol Schwaber. Monarch Rubber was sold to Armacell in 2005.
Johnson County Community College
Bradley and Libby Bergman gave $1 millionto endow the college’s performing arts series, and provide scholarships for students studying creative arts. Bradley Bergman founded Midwest Trust, a financial trust company in Orlando Park, Kan.
To learn about other big donations, see our database of gifts of $1 million or more, which is updated throughout the week.
