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2008 — the Auer endowment; 2017 — the Rolland gift
The gifts: The Allen County Public Library — a tax-supported institution — holds two of the largest documented gifts in this record. In August 2008 the ACPL Foundation received a 10 million dollar endowment from the Edward D. and Ione Auer Foundation, payable in yearly installments of 1 million dollars, directed to the library's Genealogy Center, then newly housed in the rebuilt Main Library and already the largest public genealogy collection in the country. The gift is the largest single donation in the library's history and ties the Auer name to the institution as firmly as the family's gifts tied it to the university and the arts center. In 2017 the Rolland Family Foundation gave 1 million dollars toward the creation of the Lincoln research center at the Main Library — the Rolland Center for Lincoln Research, built around the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection — and Ian and Mimi Rolland's giving to the collection extended to objects as well as funds, including the "Moody, Tearful Night" sculpture given in 2015. An earlier landmark, Sallie Wilkens Rowland's 1995 capital gift establishing the Cleo O. Wilkens Collection, is documented without a published amount and is named here in words.
Sources:
- Fort Wayne News-Sentinel (1 August 2008), as reported in GenealogyBank's account of the announcement — the Auer Foundation's 10 million dollar endowment.
- Allen County Public Library Foundation records — the endowment's installment structure.
- News-Sentinel (October 2017), via the Allen County Genealogical Society of Indiana's Lincoln Collection account — the Rolland Family Foundation's 1 million dollar gift.