‘Unwanted Child’ Bequeaths $200,000 to San Diego Planned Parenthood Unit

Mark Salo, the head of Planned Parenthood here, remembers well how he met Edward John O’Toole more than a decade ago when the frail man walked into his office dressed in bold plaids and a baseball cap--and clutching an airline bag. Salo politely asked if he could be of any help to the old man.

It turned out to be the other way around. O’Toole opened his Pan Am flight bag, and Salo found himself staring at a bundle of bonds--$50,000 worth. “I want Planned Parenthood to have this money,” O’Toole said.

And so began a strange, 11-year acquaintanceship between Salo and the mysterious visitor, who died recently at the age of 91 and left the Planned Parenthood affiliate his life’s fortune of nearly $200,000.

“He told me that he had been an unwanted child who had been left by his mother,” Salo said. “He never went into details, but it seemed to bother him terribly that he had been abandoned. He didn’t want that to happen to any other child.”

At O’Toole’s request, Salo said, the money will be used for education programs that stress family planning and services such as prenatal care, birth control, sterilization and abortion.

“Mr. O’Toole was perfectly lucid,” Salo said. “He said things in a straightforward way, and told us that this is what he wanted to do.”

The bequest followed an agreement reached by the two men at the first meeting on July 7, 1977.

Salo hesitated in accepting the initial gift of bonds, suggesting that O’Toole instead put the money in a trust that would pay him interest. Then, if O’Toole still wanted Planned Parenthood to have his fortune, Salo told him, the organization would graciously accept it upon his death. O’Toole then created a trust fund with $70,000 in bonds and a life insurance policy.

Salo never did learn much about the enigmatic O’Toole, who never married and had no children. The two men rarely met, and during the last year Salo had heard nothing from him.

“He came into my office maybe a total of six or seven times,” Salo said. “He never wanted anything back. I would say, ‘Hello, Mr. O’Toole, how are you today?’ There was some small talk, and then he left. He was a nice old man.”

“In all the time I knew him, I think we spent less than three hours together,” Salo said. “He never wanted to take up much of my time.”

In early December, Salo received a note from San Diego Trust & Savings. Edward O’Toole had died Nov. 15, 1988, the note said, and Planned Parenthood was the sole beneficiary of his trust. Bank officials say the account is worth nearly $200,000.

“It’s a shame that we don’t know more about this man,” Salo said. “All I know is that he had a very unhappy childhood. He wanted people to really think about having children.”