Natives of Washington, D.C. -- yes, there are some -- tend to call it
the "Mellon Art Gallery." Officially, and to the rest of the world,
however, it is the National Gallery of Art.
Andrew Mellon, the industrialist who founded it, never thought it
appropriate to put his name on it. Neither did Paul Mellon, his equally
philanthropic heir, who gave the museum 913 works of art during his
lifetime and bequeathed it 100 more, plus $75-million in cash.
Paul Mellon's death Feb. 1 set people to talking about the changing
spirit of philanthropy in this country. One commentator remarked how
Mellon had been willing to purchase art he didn't like because he
recognized the gallery needed to possess it.
This brought to mind how George Steinbrenner held up a $300,000 pledge
to the Florida Orchestra a few years ago because he thought its pop series
needed to sign up big-name celebrities such as Vic Damone and Tony
Bennett. The orchestra's board disagreed.
Meanwhile, some of our universities seem to be peddling naming rights
the way cities sell sports stadiums.
This is not the same thing as naming a school for the person who
originally endowed it.
A fair number of Florida lawyers happen to be in a snit at the moment
because their alma mater, the University of Florida College of Law, is now
the Frederic G. Levin College of Law. Levin, a prosperous Pensacola trial
lawyer who shared a fee in Florida's $13-billion tobacco settlement, gave
$10-million of it to the law school, where he got his degree in 1958.
The renaming offends some of the silk stockings in the Bar, who
couldn't wait to tip the press how Levin had been reprimanded by the
Florida Supreme Court for betting on football with bookmakers. As if he
were the only Gator lawyer who had ever done that.
You can bet on this: Nobody would be saying boo over the naming if
Levin had made his fortune defending corporations instead of suing
them.
But there is a case to be made, I think, that U of F President John
Lombardi sold the law school too cheaply. The $10-million that Jack Eckerd
gave in 1971 to Florida Presbyterian College, which renamed itself the
next year in his honor, was the equivalent of $41-million today. The law
school ought to have been worth at least as much. Having seen Levin's
waterfront spread, I think he might have managed.
It can be unwise to name public facilities after living people, which
is one of the reasons the Legislature said it couldn't be done with
buildings. (There is a loophole, apparently, for the schools in those
buildings.)
Years ago, Jacksonville named a waterfront fountain for a local
politician and chiseled his name into the stone. It had to be chiseled out
after he went to prison for graft. The edifice was renamed "Friendship
Fountain." Many Jacksonvillians knew it as "Felony Fountain."
In Europe, you have to be long dead to have even a street named after
you.
Speaking of Europe, we visited Frederic Chopin last summer. Also
Georges Bizet, Sarah Bernhardt, Oscar Wilde, Simone Signoret, Yves Montand
and Jim Morrison; more celebrities, in fact, than I can recall.
They are all dead, of course, which makes them so easy to visit. They
are always at home to company in the Pere Lachaise cemetery at Paris.
But it seems that Morrison, the rock star who died 28 years ago, may
not be there much longer. The management is considering evicting him at
the expiration of his 30-year lease. His estate -- like those of many
others who have come and gone -- didn't pay for perpetual care.
You could see in the security guard's face that the French authorities
aren't happy with the cultists who are constantly leaving cigarettes,
flowers and other tributes at Morrison's grave.
People bring flowers and notes to Chopin too, but they don't desecrate
other tombs with graffiti pointing the way to his grave as Morrison's
following does for him.
The temporary nature of immortality at Pere Lachaise suggests a way
America's eleemosynary institutions might more profitably satisfy the
egos of their philanthropists.
Naming rights could be granted only for the donor's lifetime or for a
fixed term of years. For that, $10-million would be a fair price.
True immortality should come dearer -- say $20-million for a building,
$50-million for a college and no less than $500-million for the whole
university.
I can see it now: H. Ross Perot University, home of the Donald Trump
Fighting Gators.