Jane K. Sather (''née'' Krom; March 9, 1824 – December 11, 1911) was an American philanthropist and one of the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

's most significant benefactors. She founded the

Sather Professorship of Classical Literature The Jane K. Sather Professorship of Classical Literature is an endowed chair for the study of classics at the University of California, Berkeley. Established in 1914 after a donation by Jane K. Sather, widow of the Norwegian-American banker Peder ...

and the Sather Professorship of History at Berkeley.

Personal life and politics

She was born Jane Krom in

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

on March 9, 1824, to a French mother and a Dutch father. Krom married

Peder Sather Peder Sather (September 25, 1810 – December 28, 1886) was a Norwegian-born American banker who is best known for his legacy to the University of California, Berkeley. His widow, Jane K. Sather, donated money in his memory for two of the sch ...

, a trustee of the University of California, in 1882 after the death of her first husband and Peder's first wife. Her first husband is named in some sources as John Reade or John Read. She was a keen supporter of women's suffrage and a prominent member of her local branch of

Sorosis Sorosis Club rules in 1869 Sorosis was the first professional women's club in the United States. It was established in March 1868 in New York City. History The club was organized in New York City with 12 members in March 1868, by Jane Cunningham ...

(est. 1868), the first professional women's club in the United States. Jane K. Sather died on December 11, 1911, and is buried in Oakland's Mountain View Cemetery.

Relationship with University of California

After Peder Sather's death, the responsibility of managing his fortune fell to Jane. She initially donated $75,000 to the university in 1900, and later a parcel of land in

Oakland Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay A ...

; further bequests of land and money were made in subsequent years. Benjamin Ide Wheeler, President of the University of California from 1899 to 1919, encouraged Jane Sather to found the Sather Professorship of Classical Literature; this enables a distinguished classical scholar to spend a term in Berkeley every year. She also donated $200 000 to the university for the building of the

Sather Tower Sather Tower is a bell tower with clocks on its four faces on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley. It is more commonly known as The Campanile ( , also ) for its resemblance to the Campanile di San Marco in Venice. It is a recog ...

, also known as "The Campanile".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sather, Jane 1824 births 1911 deaths American women philanthropists Burials at Mountain View Cemetery (Oakland, California) Businesspeople from Brooklyn 19th-century American philanthropists 19th-century American businesspeople 19th-century women philanthropists