Daniel C Searle

Daniel C. Searle, 81, a Life Trustee of Northwestern University and major donor to biomedical research and education at the University, died Oct. 30 2007 while on a pheasant hunting trip in Scotland. Mr. Searle became a member of the University Board of Trustees in 1966 and had been a Life Trustee since 2000. As an advisor to The Searle Funds at the Chicago Community Trust, Mr. Searle directed substantial grants to a wide range of Northwestern initiatives, which include the Searle Biomedical Awards at the Feinberg School of Medicine, the Searle Leadership Fund in the Life Sciences, the Chicago Biomedical Consortium and the renovation and expansion of Searle Hall, home of the University Health Center. Mr. Searle also was a trustee of the John G. Searle Family Trust, which funded the Searle Center for Teaching Excellence and, in conjunction with the Searle Fund, The Searle Center at the School of Law. Mr. Searle headed the research focused pharmaceutical company founded in Omaha in 1888 that bears his family name, G.D. Searle & Co. He joined the company after receiving a bachelor's degree in economics and accounting from Yale University in 1950 and an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School in 1952. He was named president in 1966 and chief executive officer in 1970. In 1977 he hired former North Shore Congressman Donald Rumsfeld as chief executive officer and president. Mr. Searle became chairman of the company at that time. G.D. Searle, which produced prescription and consumer pharmaceuticals, was sold eight years later to Monsanto. Mr. Searle later became an executive director of the Kinship Foundation in Northbrook. At Northwestern, he was a member of the John Evans Club, the Henry Wade Rogers Society and the Campaign Northwestern Steering Committee. He was chairman of the Life Sciences Campaign and the 1983 and 1993 Presidential Search Committees. Mr. Searle was a member of numerous corporate boards and a trustee or director of many philanthropic and civic organizations. He served as a trustee of WTTW-TV (Channel 11), a Life Trustee of the Art Institute of Chicago and a Life Director of Evanston Northwestern Healthcare. Mr. Searle is survived by two sons, D. Gideon, a Northwestern trustee, and Michael; a daughter, Anne Bent; seven grandchildren; Dain Searle; a sister, Suzanne Dixon, and her husband, Wesley Dixon; and his sister-in-law, Sally Searle. At the time of his death Mr. Searle was a resident of Hobe Sound, Fla.