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Bostock Gift Puts Duke Libraries Over Campaign Goal

A new library building at Duke will be named the Bostock Library in honor of the family of former trustee Roy J. Bostock and Merilee H. Bostock

 

DURHAM, N.C. -- A new library building at Duke University will be named the Bostock Library in honor of the family of former trustee Roy J. Bostock and Merilee H. Bostock, Duke President Nannerl O. Keohane announced Saturday.

University trustees approved the naming in recognition of the Bostocks' contributions to Duke, which include years of volunteer leadership service and more than $8 million in financial support.

On Friday, trustee chairman Peter M. Nicholas, who co-chairs with his wife Virginia the Campaign for Duke, told the trustees that the most recent Bostock gift, $2 million for the Perkins Library renovation and expansion project, had enabled the University Libraries to exceed its Campaign for Duke goal of $40 million.

Reaching the libraries' goal means that all 10 individual divisional goals have been met in the university's $2 billion fund-raising campaign, which stands at more than $2.2 billion and will end on Dec. 31.

"Roy and Merilee Bostock are devoted to their alma mater and have given considerable time and resources to strengthen Duke in so many ways," Keohane said. "Their children attended Duke; they have played a variety of leadership roles here; and their magnanimous giving has benefited many parts of our community -- none more than the library. I am delighted that their name will be permanently and prominently associated with our new library building."

That building, already under construction, is a five-story structure that will be physically linked to the university's main library, Perkins Library, on Duke's West Campus. Duke's Perkins Library System is among the nation's largest research libraries, with more than 5 million volumes. The system also includes the Lilly and Music libraries on Duke's East Campus, the Duke Marine Lab Library in Beaufort, N.C., the Library Service Center on Anson Street in Durham, the Science and Engineering libraries on the West Campus, and both the Center for Instructional Technology and the Rare Book, Manuscript and Special Collections Library within the Perkins complex.

There are additional professional school libraries within the Divinity School, the School of Law, the Fuqua School of Business and the Duke Medical Center.

A libraries' master plan calls for new library space -- the Bostock Library -- on a site adjacent to Perkins Library and for the renovation of all existing library spaces within Perkins. The plan will be implemented in phases so that library operations can be maintained throughout the project. The first phase began in October and includes the renovation of the first floor of the existing facility as well as the construction of the new building.

Along with supporting the library, Bostock family giving to Duke includes Trinity College of Arts and Sciences, the Fuqua School of Business, the Divinity School, athletics and student affairs, among other areas.

"Three generations of the Bostock family have benefited in countless ways from our association with Duke, and we are pleased that we can help support the splendid new library facility. A great university must not only have outstanding faculty and students, but the library resources that enable them to flourish in their scholarship, teaching and learning," Roy Bostock said. "With advances in technology and electronic communications, it is especially critical that Perkins Library is a state-of-the-art facility, and we are confident the new building, which Duke is graciously naming in our honor, will help strengthen the university's intellectual environment for years to come."

Bostock, the son of Duke alumna Jane R. Addis, is a 1962 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Duke who played varsity football and baseball, then earned an MBA from Harvard University. He was appointed to Duke's board of trustees in 1991, serving as chairman of its business and finance committee, and continues to be a member of a number of university organizations, including the Fuqua School of Business Board of Visitors. Bostock currently is chairing the search committee for the successor to CEO and President of the Duke University Health System Ralph Snyderman, who announced last February that he was stepping down from his posts in June 2004.

Bostock is chairman emeritus of Bcom3 Group, Inc., one of the world's leading advertising and marketing communications holding companies. He has served in the governance of a number of business, New York City and national organizations, including as a member of the Partnership for a Drug-Free America and the chair of the Committee for Economic Development.

Merilee Huser Bostock graduated from Duke's Woman's College in 1962 and currently serves on the university's Library Advisory Board (of which she is a founding member) and the Library Major Gifts Committee.

Their children, Victoria Bostock Waters, Matthew Franklin Bostock and Kate Bostock, earned Duke undergraduate degrees. Kate Bostock also has an MBA degree from the Fuqua School of Business.