School receives largest private donation to date
When USU President Stan Albrecht approached Utah businessman Marc Bingham about a possible donation to USU, Bingham’s reaction was more droll than Albrecht probably realized.
“You sons of bitches tried to keep me out when I went to college, and now you want a donation from me?” he said he thought.
Bingham was kidding.
He showed it by giving the largest single private donation in USU’s history – $15 million to go toward the construction of a building on the Uintah Basin campus in Vernal.
Bingham, a USU alumnus, said he lost contact with the university over the years until Albrecht came to him with the idea of donating.
“I said, ‘I’ll build you a building,'” he said.
The building will be the second on the Vernal campus. It will be an Entrepreneurship and Energy Research Center and will be used to train students in fields ranging from business to engineering to environmental policy and more.
Robert Foley, chair of the Education Committee for the Vernal area Chamber of Commerce and a member of USU’s Board of Trustees, said the gift of Bingham and his wife, Debbie, will fulfill long-time goals for USU’s Vernal campus.
“Many of us have dreamed for years of a campus presence in Vernal,” Foley said. “We all would like to thank you, Mr. Bingham, for making those dreams real.”
Bingham, a Vernal native, graduated from USU in 1963 with a degree in wildlife management. He said he spent several semesters teetering on the edge of academic probation – hence the “you tried to keep me out” comment. After graduating, he worked a few years with the Bureau of Land Management before becoming involved in business and establishing the Phone Directories Company, one of the most successful independent publishers in the yellow page industry.
Now officially retired, Bingham said it was just time to start giving back.
“I’ve been a little bit lucky in life,” he said. “I’ve come a long way from picking up roadkill for a living.
“We’ve reached that time in life where we’re getting to retire. We have enough to do what we want to do and have some left over. You can’t take it with you. I never saw a hearse with a U-Haul trailer behind it full of money.”
The Binghams have also donated land to the College of Eastern Utah for the Mesozoic Gardens.
“Mr. Bingham’s contribution will have lasting effects on the educational culture and environment in the Uintah Basin,” Albrecht said. “It will raise the level of education and the quality of life in the basin. But, most important for the community, it will support Utah State University’s broader effort to help the basin recruit its own, educate its own and return them to the local community as educated citizens, business people and leaders.”
Bingham said he considers the building a sort of legacy for himself and his wife.
“Back in my day, it was a five-hour drive to get to school,” he said. “It doesn’t take much to get to college, but it takes a whole lot to stay in college.”
Bingham said college can be a useful and productive time, but students should know there’s more to be learned.
“It’s the best place to become a young adult,” he said. “College is a great place to get an education, but it doesn’t give you the wherewithal to survive in life. You have to work with people. If you give enough people what they want in life, you’ll get what you want in life.”
A ceremony celebrating the gift will be held Oct. 25 in the Uintah Basin. Planning and design will begin on the Entrepreneurship and Energy Research Center this semester, and construction is slated to start early next year. The building is expected to be ready for use in 2009.
The building will be used jointly by USU and the Uintah Basin Applied Technology College. Other donations by private persons and local government entities to the Uintah Basin campus have augmented the larger donations by the Binghams and others.
-elizabeth.lawyer@aggiemail.usu.edu