SAN MARINO, Calif.–A gift from the estate of Frances Lasker Broder is expected to be worth more than $100 million to The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, museum officials said today.
The bequest is by far the biggest ever for The Huntington, and is equivalent to a 40 percent boost in its endowment, museum President Steven Koblik said.
Brody, the widow of real estate developer Sidney Brody, was longtime Huntington board member and avid art collector. She died last year at age 93.
“We are overwhelmed by Francie’s generosity and her vision,” Koblik said. “She was an extraordinary woman with a fierce intellect who thought strategically and was completely tuned in to The Huntington’s challenges, its culture and its capacity.”
The Huntington received about $15 million from the estate in October, then about $80 million last week. And Brody’s home, part of the gift, is on the market for about $24 million.
Brody was a vegetable gardener, and part of the gift will go toward developing a potager, or kitchen garden, among other garden projects.
She and husband Sidney, who owned paintings by Picasso, Matisse, Renoir and other European masters, were instrumental in founding the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1965 and creating the UCLA sculpture garden.
The Huntington’s biggest gift before Brody’s was $21 million from Charles and Nancy Munger in 2002. Brody’s gift could even be larger than railroad titan Henry Huntington’s original endowment, which is valued at $107 million adjusted for inflation.
The Huntington.
