Launch of the University Librarian’s Development Council
One year after the official launch of the Yale Tomorrow Capital Campaign launch, the Library Tomorrow campaign is well underway. One notable coup for the Library is the recent appointment of a Chairman to the newly formed University Librarians Development Council. William H. Wright II ’82, Managing Director at Morgan Stanley, committed volunteer in several capacities at Yale and extremely generous donor to the Yale Library, has agreed to oversee the activities of this new council of volunteers. The group will help the Library to make important connections and to help host events around the country that highlight important Library funding opportunities.
An investment banker with more than twenty years experience, Bill manages complex financing arrangements for leading national and international companies and governments.
He was born in Hempstead, Texas, and raised in Norfolk, Virginia, and during his junior year at Yale was publisher of the Yale Daily News and coxswain of the lightweight crew team while an undergraduate major in history. Since his graduation from Yale, Mr. Wright has been involved in both the University’s financial support and programmatic reviews. He chaired the gift committees for his tenth and fifteenth class reunions. In 1993 he was appointed to the Yale Alumni Fund Board and was elected to a two-year term as chair in 2004. He also serves on the Development Board and Campaign Executive Committee. In 2001 Mr. Wright was appointed to the University Council, which advises the president and officers about selected academic and administrative issues. He became a trustee of the Berkeley Divinity School at Yale in January 2006.
While visiting campus late last year, Bill addressed a standing-room-only crowd in Sterling Memorial Library, sharing some reflections on the important role the Yale Library had played in his own student days and how this served to fuel his passion for proclaiming the critical role of libraries in today’s world.
Alice Prochaska, University Librarian, says "I am thrilled and deeply grateful that Bill Wright has agreed to take on this important role on behalf of the Library. His standing as the first African-American alumnus of Yale College to become a major donor, and his deep commitment to the Library as a place that meant so much to him in his undergraduate days, make him an especially suitable chairman for the University Librarian's Development Council. More than that, Bill's extraordinary interest in people and his support for everything that goes on at Yale, coupled with his infectious enthusiasm and wonderful sense of humor, have made him well known and loved among all generations of Yalies, present students very much included. It will be an inspiration to work with him."
Amanda Patrick (ajp)
