Pellegrins give $1.2 million to WAA scholarship fund

Thanks to a new scholarship fund through the Wisconsin Alumni Association Endowment, the names George and Dorothy Pellegrin may soon be synonymous with education in Fort Atkinson, Wis. But that’s only appropriate. Fort Atkinson was always very good to the Pellegrin family.

The Wisconsin town was the site of one of the Pellegrins’ most successful business ventures, Johnson Hill Press. So when their sons, Jonathan and David, were looking for a way to memorialize their parents, they chose to give back to Fort Atkinson. The two brothers set up the George and Dorothy Pellegrin Charitable Remainder Trust, a $1.2 million fund that will support scholarships for Fort Atkinson students who attend UW–Madison.

Both George and Dorothy Pellegrin are alumni of UW–Madison, as is Jonathan, who served as president of WAA from 1983-84.

The Pellegrin trust is the largest gift to the WAA Endowment so far, and it is expected to provide $60,000 to $65,000 of revenue each year. This will mean at least two scholarships for Fort Atkinson students, as well as scholarship money to aid UW–Madison’s diversity efforts.

The WAA endowment was created in 2002 as part of the University of Wisconsin Foundation’s capital campaign, Create the Future: The Wisconsin Campaign. WAA’s Endowment aims to establish a perpetual source of funding for alumni learning and leadership. Its three main tenets of support are for lifelong learning, recognition awards and scholarships, and the Below Alumni Center improvements.