Carnegie Mellon Should be Renamed Carnegie Mellon Dietrich University

By Nancy Zuo, Junior Staffwriter

In 2011, William Dietrich II (also known as “Uncle Bill”) made one of the 10 largest donations of a private donor to a private university in U.S history by gifting $265 million to Carnegie Mellon. Two weeks later, he gave the largest private donation in Pitt’s history by gifting $125 million the school. Instead of naming the colleges after himself, Dietrich asked to name the Dietrich in honor of his father, Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences, and the Dietrich at CMU in honor of his mother, Marianna Brown Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

He passed away two weeks later.

Dietrich himself didn’t go to Carnegie Mellon. He went to the University of Pittsburgh for his master’s and Ph.D. in Political Science. He made his wealth by taking over and expanding Dietrich Industries, a steel framing manufacturing company, from his father. He dedicated the rest of his life to helping the western Pennsylvania community by serving on the Board of Trustees at Carnegie Mellon University, the Carnegie Museum of Art, the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre, the UPMC Health System, and the University of Pittsburgh.

Adjusted for inflation, Dietrich’s gift is about 10 times the amount Andrew Carnegie himself gave the university to start the school. Andrew Carnegie gave $1 million in 1900, which is worth about $26.7 million in 2011. His donations are also greater than the donations from the Mellon Foundation, whose relationship sparked CMU to change its name from Carnegie Tech to Carnegie Mellon in 1967.

If the university could change its name 67 years after its founding, it can change it again another 56 years after later. Andrew Carnegie and Andrew Mellon may have the same first name, but that doesn’t mean William isn’t cut out to be part of it. Since Dietrich donated more than both Andrew Carnegie and Andrew Mellon, he should be acknowledged at the same capacity, if not even more for his contributions.

His generous gift to the university comes from a place of goodwill and a strong call to bring Pittsburgh back to the days of the ‘golden age’ which he refers to as the time period between the 1870 and 1910.

He names the college in remembrance of his mother, who passed away at 50 years old, and left a significant impact on him. In Carnegie Mellon’s official announcement of his gift on September 8, 2011, he ends in his speech:

“My mother would be thrilled to have her name associated with this wonderful school. My hope is that by naming this college for her, we remember some of the values that made her life so meaningful. I note that we often refer to our university as our alma mater, [which in Latin means] our mother school. There is wisdom in that idea. Sometimes in the strive to compete and the struggle we forget that underpinning all our achievement and accomplishment is a simple sense of being loved. It’s that feeling of security that allows us to take the risks, dream the dream, and dare to live life with the courage that is forged by nurturing and abiding care. With Marianna Brown college, we will now have a constant reminder of this wisdom.”