Anne Scheiber's Gift
Published: December 05, 1995
With the season of holidays and gift-giving comes the story of Anne Scheiber, a 101-year-old recluse who spent her retirement quietly turning a $5,000 nest egg into a $22 million stock portfolio. She then left the entire fortune that she had accumulated over half a century to Yeshiva University, to establish scholarships for needy women students there.
"Here's a woman who for 101 years was childless and now becomes a mother to a whole community," said the president of the university.
During her life, Ms. Scheiber had no direct contact with the university, or indeed with just about anyone except her lawyer and stockbroker. Although she clearly had a genius for finance, she founded no business. She had no close family, and no friends. She had no projects, no charities, did no volunteer work. She retired a half-century ago from the Internal Revenue Service feeling that her hard work there had gone unrewarded because of her sex. It was apparently that memory that inspired her bequest.
Ms. Scheiber's gift recalls the story of Oseola McCarty, the 87-year-old Mississippi woman who earlier this year donated $150,000 earned in a lifetime of doing other people's laundry to endow scholarships for black students at the University of Southern Mississippi. Both women lived simply, and cared nothing about possessions. That may explain why they gave their money for opportunity, rather than plaques or buildings.
Besides money, both women left us a lesson. We can touch the future in many different ways. The childless can leave their imprint on the young for generations to come. The friendless can transform a community. The quietest can make a great noise.
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/05/opinion/anne-scheiber-s-gift.html
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