A Windfall for Cal Lutheran

An Oxnard millionaire has donated $2 million to Cal Lutheran University, the second-largest gift in the private college’s history, as part of a campaign to build a sports complex on the Thousand Oaks campus.

The gift by John B. “Jack” Gilbert, 81, founder of the TOLD Corp. construction firm, supports development of a gymnasium in an $18-million sports and fitness center north of Olsen Road near Campus Drive.

“For the last four or five years they’ve talked about doing something along these lines. Somebody had to get the ball started,” said Gilbert, who still works four days a week in his company’s Camarillo headquarters. “I hope I’ve created the momentum to get this thing done.”

“A lot of people leave money in their wills,” he said. “But since I hope to live a few more years, I’d like to see a few of these things while I’m still alive.”

Gilbert, a Cal Lutheran regent from 1994 to 1997, has been involved with the 2,800-student college for 17 years. It honored him with a “doctor of laws” degree in 1990.

A self-made entrepreneur who never finished high school, Gilbert made his first fortune with a small sheet metal shop in Burbank, moved to Ventura County in 1972, and flourished through construction of about 250 office, industrial and high-tech buildings.

Gilbert said the poor state of Cal Lutheran’s athletic venues -- no pool on campus and a 42-year-old gym -- prompted him to make the donation.

“The facility there is not as good as they are in the average high school,” he said. “If Cal Lutheran is going to take its place as full-fledged university, it has to have a decent athletic facility.”

Plans approved in 1999 call for construction of a two-story sports complex that will contain a 1,500-seat main gym named after Gilbert, a smaller practice gym, a fitness center, dance studio, sports medicine facility, offices for faculty and coaches and a hall of fame.

Construction of the sports complex, involving concrete, tilt-up methods, is set to begin in 2004 and take about 12 months to complete.

So far, however, just $2.8 million of the $18-million cost has been raised, including Gilbert’s contribution.

Valerie Crooks, project manager for the North Campus Athletic Facility Complex, said the sports and fitness center is only one component in a five- to 10-year building program on 80 acres at the university.

Total cost for the entire project is $44 million, she said.

A 300-seat baseball stadium named after former major league manager and Thousand Oaks resident Sparky Anderson is also planned. So is an outdoor aquatic center with a 50-meter pool, and a new running track.

At build-out, the north campus also would have 15 new tennis courts, a 3,000-seat football stadium, a 1,000-seat soccer stadium and a 300-seat women’s softball field.

Also planned are a small, infield-only baseball practice area; a 400-meter track, including an area for field events; and six practice fields for various intramural sports.

A preschool currently on the site would be relocated along Campus Drive and expanded to accommodate 140 children from the current 92.

In all, the university hopes to raise $80 million to pay for long-term building efforts, said university spokeswoman Lynda Paige Fulford.

Major benefactors for the $2.8 million raised so far include Karsten Lundring of Thousand Oaks, whose family pledged $575,000, and former regent Ronald Anderson of Fullerton, who has given $100,000.

Cal Lutheran’s largest gift is $3 million from alumnus Allan Spies and Karen (Bornemann) Spies, a Denver couple whose families contributed nearly half the cost of building a 23,000-square-foot education and technology building bearing their names.

That building will be dedicated during ceremonies Saturday afternoon.