Lorry I. Lokey (March 27, 1927 – October 1, 2022) was an American businessperson and philanthropist. A native of

Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the list of cities in Oregon, largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, Portland is ...

, he founded the company

Business Wire Business Wire is an American company that disseminates full-text press releases from thousands of companies and organizations worldwide to news media, financial markets, disclosure systems, investors, information web sites, databases, bloggers, ...

in 1961 and donated in excess of $700 million to charities, with the majority of the money given to schools. He resided in San Francisco during his later years.

Early life

Lorry Lokey was born on March 27, 1927, in

, and raised in the

Northeast Portland Northeast Portland is one of the six major divisions of Portland, Oregon. Northeast Portland contains a diverse collection of neighborhoods. For example, while Irvington and the Alameda Ridge feature some of the oldest and most expensive homes i ...

neighborhood of

Alameda An alameda is a Avenue (landscape), street or path lined with trees () and may refer to: Places Canada *Alameda, Saskatchewan, town in Saskatchewan **Grant Devine Dam, formerly ''Alameda Dam'', a dam and reservoir in southern Saskatchewan Chile ...

during the Depression. His

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

family practiced charity, setting the example for Lokey. He attended Alameda Elementary School in Portland,"Portland native pledges $5M for library".
''

Portland Business Journal Portland most commonly refers to: * Portland, Oregon, the largest city in the state of Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States * Portland, Maine, the largest city in the state of Maine, in the New England region of the northeas ...

'', May 29, 2007."Lokey gives UO largest gift: $74.5M".
''

'', October 15, 2007. then graduated from Grant High School before being draftedLorry Lokey, Atherton philanthropist and Business Wire founder, dies
(Emily Mibach) Palo Alto Daily Post, October 3, 2022 into the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

, then deployed to Japan during the final months of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

.McBride, Tess
"The man behind the money".
''

Oregon Daily Emerald The ''Daily Emerald'' is the independent, student-run weekly newspaper produced at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, United States. Its predecessor, the ''Oregon Daily Emerald'' newspaper, founded in 1899, trained many prominent write ...

'', February 9, 2007. While in the service he worked on the '' Pacific Stars & Stripes'' as an editor after the war ended. Lokey resumed college in 1947, having been drafted into the army in 1944, following his freshman year, graduating from Stanford University in

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was es ...

, with a bachelor of arts degree in journalism."Lorry Lokey gives Stanford stem cell institute $33M".
'' San Jose Business Journal'', February 27, 2007. At Stanford, he worked on ''

The Stanford Daily ''The Stanford Daily'' is the student-run, independent daily newspaper serving Stanford University. ''The Daily'' is distributed throughout campus and the surrounding community of Palo Alto, California, United States. It has published since the ...

'', becoming editor of the school newspaper in 1949. Upon graduation Lokey began working for United Press, now

United Press International United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20t ...

(UPI), and then at newspapers and in the public relations field. One newspaper he worked for was '' The Daily News'' in

Longview, Washington Longview is a city in Cowlitz County, Washington, United States. It is the principal city of the Longview, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Cowlitz County. Longview's population was 37,818 at the time of the 2 ...

Business career

Inspired by the sight of a teletype machine transfering financial news during a conference in Los Angeles, Lokey started

, a news release service, in 1961. Founded in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

, California, the company started with seven clients on the first day of business.Caldwell, Douglas E
"Profile: Spreading the word".
'' San Jose Business Journal'', July 4, 2003. The company expanded and became an international wire service with 30 offices around the world. By 2003, the company had grown to 450 employees with annual revenue of $110 million. In 2006, Lokey sold Business Wire for approximately $600 million to

Berkshire Hathaway Berkshire Hathaway Inc. () is an American multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, United States. Its main business and source of capital is insurance, from which it invests the float (the retained premiu ...

Warren Buffett Warren Edward Buffett ( ; born August 30, 1930) is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is currently the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. He is one of the most successful investors in the world and has a net ...

's corporation.

Philanthropy

Lokey began donating large sums of money to charities in 1990. By 2007, he had donated more than $400 million, of which 98 percent was given to secondary and post-secondary education. Some schools include the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc, and its co-founder, billion ...

Mills College Mills College at Northeastern University is a private college in Oakland, California and part of Northeastern University's global university system. Mills College was founded as the Young Ladies Seminary in 1852 in Benicia, California; it was ...

, Stanford University, the Technion, Santa Clara University, Bellarmine College Preparatory, and

Portland State University Portland State University (PSU) is a public research university in Portland, Oregon. It was founded in 1946 as a post-secondary educational institution for World War II veterans. It evolved into a four-year college over the following two decad ...

. These efforts led to his listing as one of the ten highest donors in the United States by the ''Chronicle of Philanthropy'' in 2006. He was also an early signer of

The Giving Pledge The Giving Pledge is a campaign to encourage extremely wealthy people to contribute a majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes. , the pledge has 236 signatories from 28 countries. Most of the signatories of the pledge are billionaires, a ...

. During his lifetime, Lokey donated over 90% of his fortune,A Philanthropist at Heart
Christine Foster; Stanford Magazine; December 2022. exceeding . In 2018, he donated $10 million to the

University of Haifa The University of Haifa ( he, אוניברסיטת חיפה Arabic: جامعة حيفا) is a university located on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel. Founded in 1963, the University of Haifa received full academic accreditation in 1972, becoming ...

for the construction of a new building in downtown

Haifa Haifa ( he, חֵיפָה ' ; ar, حَيْفَا ') is the third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropol ...

, Israel. As of June 2014, Lokey had also donated a total of $139.9 million to the University of Oregon in Eugene. This includes a $74.5 million donation in 2007 that was the second most ever given to the school, and the largest donation designated for academics. The 2007 donation went towards the creation of the Lorry I. Lokey Science Advancement and Graduate Education Initiative. In October 2008, the Stanford School of Medicine announced that Lokey would donate $75 million for a research facility.
The facility is named the Lorry I. Lokey Stem Cell Research Building. He also donated money to establish a new chemistry building at the

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) ( he, אוניברסיטת בן-גוריון בנגב, ''Universitat Ben-Guriyon baNegev'') is a public research university in Beersheba, Israel. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev has five campuses: the ...

in Israel.

Personal life

Lokey had three daughters. He died in Atherton, California, on October 1, 2022, at age 95.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lokey, Lorry 1927 births 2022 deaths American chief executives Jewish American military personnel United States Army personnel of World War II Philanthropists from Oregon Businesspeople from Portland, Oregon Military personnel from Portland, Oregon Giving Pledgers 21st-century philanthropists Grant High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni Jewish American philanthropists Businesspeople from San Francisco Stanford University alumni United States Army soldiers University of Oregon people 21st-century American Jews 20th-century American Jews