City of Hope Directors Hail New Chief Shapero

Dr. Stanford M. Shapero, newly named chief executive officer of City of Hope, was center stage at a reception hosted by the medical center and research institute’s directors at the Beverly Hilton’s L’Escoffier Room. His wife Evelyn was among the 400 arranged by Mrs. Lee Graff, longtime board member.

During the elegant five-course dinner in the Music Center Blue Ribbon Room, Mrs. John David Maguire and H. Russell Smith were deep in conversation about what makes some rich people benevolent and others not. So when her other dinner companion, CBS correspondent and senior news analyst Bill Moyers, left the table to address the audience on preeminence--of all kinds--Billie Maguire prodded him: “Now, go tell them to tithe.”

It was the tenor of the evening: Claremont Graduate School was revealing officially its aim to raise $50 million in A Campaign for Preeminence--seeking funds to establish new faculty positions, expand scholarships, build and strengthen. It was the kind of evening that kept Claremont President Maguire beaming.

To begin, Chairman of the Board of Fellows Ronald L. Olson, also Southern California division co-chair with Peter K. Barker, introduced Kenneth O. Rhodes, who announced that the Board of Fellows of the Claremont University Center and Graduate School has already set the pace: $14,856,000 of its $15.5 million goal has been pledged. Then, national campaign chairman Donald F. Wright revealed that $30.1 million has been pledged by foundations and board members.

There was applause when Wright added that among those gifts is one from a Claremont Fellow (they can be women) for $10.8 million, the largest gift in 1985 to a U.S. educational institution. “The donor insists on remaining anonymous,” he said. That only created polite speculation.

H. Russell Smith, chairman of the Pomona College trustees and a Fellow, followed at the podium: “You keep up that progress report,” he joshed, “and before the end of the evening we will have reached our goal.”

Fellows were scattered throughout the audience. One, Miss Helen M. Smith, a Claremont professor of music and philanthropist, joined the table with three past presidents of the graduate school: Louis T. Benezet, Howard R. Bowen and Joseph B. Platt. (High tribute went to the late James Blaisdell, responsible for the Claremont cluster concept.) Another Fellow, William Belzberg, was joined by his wife, Barbara Elaine, dramatic in black.

Other Fellows in the audience included Wilford M. Farnsworth with his wife Ella; Henry Y. Hwang with Dorothy, Robert B. Egelston, John E. Bryson with Louise, Peter K. Barker with Robin, Barbara Babcock, J. Anthony Kouba with Patricia, Jon B. Lovelace with Lillian, Peggy Phelps, Lynn A. Schenk with her husband Hugh Friedman, Ellson F. Smith with Birdean, Ben Winters, and Olson with his wife Jane, and Wright and his wife Sharon.

Joining Maguire at one head table (there were a number), were Stanton and Ernestine Avery, Tom and Edwina Johnson, Judith Moyers (trustee vice chairman of the State University of New York) and Norman Lear with Lyn Davis.

Assemblywoman Teresa Hughes, ranking woman member of the state legislature, lauded her alma mater (she has a Ph.D.), noting that “No one has ever questioned my educational credentials.”

It fell, however, to Moyers to stir the audience: “The rich need to be touched by the poor; the poor need to be touched by the rich; the old need to be touched by the young, and the young by the old . . . There is no such thing as going it alone.”

He suggested goals “to quicken the moral imagination--the science of the heart.” And he asked, “How does a life take on a worth that transcends the mere journey of banality?” He observed, “Someone touched them--(said) you have a value; you make a difference.” For him, he noted, the difference had been teachers. The Claremont crowd liked that.

The Irish love Tom Bergin’s, that house of Irish coffee and fun and chatter at 840 S. Fairfax. It was just 50 years ago that Los Angeles lawyer Tom Bergin decided to hang up his shingle, hang out his shillelagh and open his tavern restaurant back when a prime rib dinner cost 75 cents.

The actual birthday was Wednesday. But Irishman T. K. Vodrey (“K” for his grandmother, Dorothy Kelly), and not so Irish, Mike Mandekic, owners for 13 years, will be celebrating until St. Patrick’s Day.

Five actors from the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Old Vic and the Cambridge Theatre Company join a small group of invited guests Saturday at the UCLA Clark Library for an afternoon of readings from Shakespeare and a traditional English tea.

It’s the inaugural event presented by the Friends of English, a new affiliate of the Deans’ Council support group of the UCLA College of Letters & Science. English department chairman Daniel Calder, humanities dean Herbert Morris and executive vice chancellor William Schaefer will welcome 100, including George and Jane Sidney, Arthur Hill, Jim and Nancy Kindel, Paul and Joan Selwyn, A. J. and Caryl Carothers and James and Inge Miscoll.

St. Nicholas Cathedral Ladies Society hosts its 38th annual Debutante Sweetheart Ball Saturday evening in the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton. Mrs. Paul Romley, ball chairman, expects 700 guests.

USC Associates assemble for a cocktail reception and tour of the Tournament of Roses headquarters at the historic Tournament House in Pasadena Wednesday. Dr. Cornelius Pings, USC’s provost, will speak.

The Pasadena Playhouse, announcing its opening, hosts a centennial “taste of Pasadena” buffet Thursday at the playhouse.