A haven in her childhood, George School is rewarded Posted on May 11th
She returned this week to the place that helped shape her so long ago, her debt now squared beyond imagination.
Barbara Dodd Anderson was 13 and frightened when she first set foot on the sprawling, verdant grounds of George School in 1946.
Her mother, in the depths of mental illness, no longer could care for her. Her father, a renowned professor at Columbia University, was determined that his only child not become a latchkey kid in New York City.
At the urging of a friend, he sent young Barbara to the Quaker-affiliated boarding school just south of Newtown in Bucks County.
“I just loved George School; everybody was kind to me,” Dodd Anderson, 75, said in an interview yesterday. “They knew of what was happening, and they kept their eye on me.
“It was kind of a nest when I came in here, because it was such a scary time for me.”
Today, the school will pay tribute to Dodd Anderson, who recently feathered that nest in record fashion.
In September, George School officials made the jaw-dropping announcement that Dodd Anderson had bestowed a $128.5 million gift on the school.
It was the largest single donation ever made to a United States private school. It added to the nearly $10 million she already had given George School over the years.
A lively, slender woman who dresses simply, drives a Buick and laughs easily, Dodd Anderson lives in Fresno, Calif., in a home she says could use some fixing up.
Still, she says, neighbors and strangers who heard of her gift have since approached or written to her seeking money, “and some got snotty about it.
“I tried to tell them as gently as I could that this is a different situation,” she said. “I think education is more important than whether you have a nice, new house.”
This morning, during the school’s annual Alumni Day, she will receive a 2008 Alumni Award, then participate in a groundbreaking ceremony for a new library and “green” learning commons, both direct results of her largesse.
It is her first visit in several years. She spent much of yesterday’s sodden morning on campus being hugged and thanked, then lunching with a group of Anderson Scholars - 16 students who receive aid through a scholarship fund she created years ago.