Fred Fields

Mr. Fields, who was 88 when he died in 2011, left the bulk of his estate to 13 nonprofits. He bequeathed roughly $166-million to the Oregon Community Foundation to establish a fund to support education and the arts in Oregon, where he spent most of his career. He placed no restrictions on any of his other bequests. He donated $10-million to Lewis & Clark College, which will use the money to endow scholarships for undergraduates, law-school students, and those attending the college’s Graduate School of Education and Counseling. Mr. Fields served on the college’s board for 21 years. In addition, he left $2-million apiece to five organizations: the Oregon Historical Society, Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, Oregon Health & Science University Foundation, Purdue University, and University of Oregon. He also left $1-million each to Columbia River Maritime Museum, Eisenhower Medical Center, Lake Erie College, Portland Art Museum, and Ronald McDonald House Charities of Oregon and Southwest Washington. And he gave $500,000 to Boy Scouts of America, Cascade Pacific Council. While Mr. Fields and his wife, Sue, who died in 2010, had donated smaller amounts to many of these organizations over the years, most had no idea they were included in his will, and not one knew it would receive such a substantial gift. A child of the Depression, Mr. Fields worked on his family’s farm from the age of 10. He served in the U.S. Army Air Corps and studied engineering at Purdue in 1946. Unable to afford tuition, he left after one year and went back home to Alexandria, Ind. to work on the farm. In 1947, he landed an engineering job at Coe Manufacturing, which made machines that milled lumber and other wood products. He remained at Coe for 53 years, working his way up to the leadership role. In 1976, his friend and lawyer, the late Garthe Brown (No. 28 on The Chronicle’s Philanthropy 50 talked him into buying the company, which Mr. Fields eventually sold in 2000.