Impact: The Million Dollar Fund

The Million Dollar Fund, created from gifts by Bates alumni and friends in the 1920s, is just one example of endowed funds can yield millions of dollars to support the college’s mission while also growing in market value over time.

The Million Dollar Fund (1924)

Starting Book Value: $600,000 (the remaining $400K funded construction of Gray Athletic Building and Alumni Gymnasium
Current Market Value: $2,996,264
Amount Spent to Support Bates This Year: $145,918
Total Spent to Support Bates Since Inception: Nearly $7 million

A century ago, Bates was on the move: new buildings, expanded faculty, and a larger and more talented student body than ever before.

With growth came challenges. Then as now, the cost of a delivering a Bates education exceeded the income from tuition. Same as now, the solution to balance the books was philanthropy — specifically a larger permanent endowment.

Hence the endowment-focused Million Dollar Fund campaign.

historical photo of man shining shoes — In 1922, as a publicity stunt to raise awareness locally of the Million Dollar Fund for the Bates endowment, President Clifton Daggett Gray shines shoes in a downtown shop. (Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)

“If we do not have a largely increased endowment at once we shall face an inevitable major surgical operation on our budget,” President Clifton Daggett Gray told the Lewiston Evening Journal in 1922.

Of the million raised, Bates placed $600,000 in its endowment in 1924, spending the balance to build two iconic buildings, Alumni Gym and Gray Athletic Building. Today, the fund’s market value has grown to nearly $3 million, and over the past century Bates has been able to spend approximately $7 million from the fund to support the college.

The George Winfield Treat and Elsie Reynolds Treat Fund (1963)

Another example of an unrestricted endowed fund that has grown over time while supporting Bates each year is the George Winfield Treat and Elsie Reynolds Treat Fund.

George Winfield Treat and Elsie Reynolds Treat Fund (1963)

Starting Principal: $782,270
Current Market Value: $3,906,482
Amount Spent to Support Bates in FY25: $201,574
Total Spent to Support Bates Since Inception: Nearly $6 million

Elsie Reynolds Treat graduated in 1904 and supported Bates all her life. In 1960, the college named its new art exhibition space, located in Pettigrew Hall, as the Treat Art Gallery, in appreciation of the gifts to Bates by Elsie Treat and her husband, George Winfield Treat.

Today, their gifts of $782,000 are worth nearly $4 million.

man and woman posing, man holding plaque — In June 1960, President Charles Franklin Phillips poses with Elsie Reynolds Treat, Class of 1904, during a dedication of the new Treat Art Gallery in Pettigrew Hall.

historical portrait of a woman — *Claramay Purington, Class of 1912.*

The Claramay Purington Fund (1965)

A third unrestricted endowed fund was given by a Bates graduate who moved west after graduation to work in business.

Claramay Purington graduated in 1912 with membership in Phi Beta Kappa. She taught school in Maine before heading to California.

She was a financial secretary in the securities department of Pacific Mutual Life Insurance Co., and during World War II was a partner in the Keystone Aircraft Parts Co.

Purington died in 1965. In 1966, President Charles Franklin Phillips announced her bequest, noting that it would “benefit Bates men and women.” Totaling $300,000, her bequest is now worth $1.5 million.

Claramay Purington Fund (1965)

Starting Principal: $302,582
Current Market Value: $1,511,027
Amount Spent to Support Bates in FY25: $77,969
Total Spent to Support Bates Since Inception: $2.8 milion