MENDOTA — A 1984 Mendota High School graduate and his wife have donated $150 million to the College of Business on the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus.
The news of the donation by venture capitalist Larry Gies — founder, president and chief executive officer of Chicago-based Madison Industries — does not come as a surprise to his friends back home.
“Larry’s had a fond place in his heart for the University of Illinois forever,” Chad Bromenschenkel said of Gies, a University of Illinois graduate in addition to being a graduate of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern. “He would always want to do that, knowing Larry real well.”
Bromenschenkel stays in contact with Gies, occasionally golfing and sometimes talking about the firefighting equipment business. One of the many businesses Madison Capital owns makes tips for fire hoses and another deals in rescue tools, said Bromenschenkel, who works in sales for Amboy-based Dinges Fire Co.
Bromenschenkel said when Gies comes home to Mendota, his former Motor Wheel Tigers baseball teammate just seems like one of the other guys. Bromenschenkel said Gies always had an interest in business and his best sport at Mendota High was wrestling.
Both Bromenschenkel and Putnam County native and Geneva teacher and coach Bryan Ketter describe Gies as down-to-earth, and a successful family man. Ketter coached two of Gies’s boys as they were growing up. He said Gies has a daughter in high school and he believes the boys are at Stanford and Vanderbilt.
“Larry’s a great guy. This would not surprise me that he would do this,” Ketter said.
As reported by The Associated Press, school officials said Thursday morning that the school will now be known as the Gies College of Business after the gift from Larry and Beth Gies. Both are University of Illinois graduates.
Larry Gies said in a statement that the college is special to him and is where he “developed a foundation for success.” He says the investment is about the students.
Gies’ Madison Industries, a privately held company, has owned or operated more than 100 businesses.
UIUC chancellor Robert Jones said the donation will let the school “significantly increase” investments in students, faculty and programs. The business school has more than 5,100 students.
A phone call to Gies’ office phone was not returned to the NewsTribune by press time.
More information on Madison Industries is available at www.madison.net or https://madison.net/leadership, which notes: “Gies serves as the president of The Gies Foundation (which focuses on youth, education and health) and is a featured speaker at several universities. He was instrumental in establishing The Gies Campus of Chicago Jesuit Academy (a full scholarship school focused on 3rd-8th grade education for boys on Chicago’s West Side).”
Craig Sterrett can be reached at (815) 220-6935 or ntlocal@newstrib.com. Follow him on Twitter @NT_NewsEditor.