A new scholarship at the University of Oregon is born out of a decades-long friendship. Fred Petri is the namesake of this scholarship inspired by longtime business partner and friend, Dave Petrone, a leader of the UO's $2 billion campaign. The bond between these two is the kind of story behind a gift that too often gets lost.
Fred became an adopted Duck during more than 40 years in business with Dave, a UO Foundation trustee emeritus who earned his bachelor’s and MBA degrees here in the 1960s and has championed the university ever since.
When Fred’s life partner, Linda Morasch, heard about Dave’s involvement with the UO’s campaign, she phoned him immediately.
“She said she knew Fred would like to make a gift to the University of Oregon through his foundation,” Dave recalls.
Linda is more specific about Fred's gratitude.
“Fred would want to make a donation to the University of Oregon as a thank you for being a loyal partner and friend,” she says.
Dave and Frank were executives at Wells Fargo Bank until 1993, when they left to form their own real estate firm. Within a year, they had formed Housing Capital Company, a joint venture with US Bancorp. They ran the business together until an Alzheimer’s diagnosis forced Fred’s retirement in 2011.
“Dave watched out for Fred’s interest in Housing Capital and took on total management of the company as Fred’s participation lessened,” Linda says. ”Their ideas about giving back and causes they supported were fostered over many years working together.”
Over time, they talked a lot about giving back. Fred, Dave says, did many generous things with his time and money, often very quietly and discreetly. Linda said Fred was “always trying to help the underdog or someone he felt was making an effort to succeed.”
As a result, the UO’s Fred Petri Scholarship targets middle-income students from Oregon who would have to take on significant debt in order to attend the UO.
“Fred realized he was privileged to have his college education paid for by his parents and that many middle-class students cannot count on the same,” Linda says. “Borrowing money to go to school can having lasting negative impacts. The more I have learned about the scholarship world, the more I realized middle class students are under served.”
Like Dave, Fred became a champion of his alma mater, the University of Wisconsin, and bolstered several nonprofit organizations. He served on the boards of the YMCA, his church, the University of Wisconsin’s Global Real Estate Master’s Program, and the Visiting Nurses Association.
Both came from Midwestern families that valued character above all.
“Foundationally, we’re the same,” Dave says of his friend. ”We think a lot about people.”
Linda originally met Fred and Dave in her role as CFO of Ponderosa Homes Inc., a real estate firm based in Pleasanton, California. She hopes the Petri scholarship will remind recipients to stay focused on what really matters as they pursue success.
“People like Dave Petrone and Fred Petri have always conducted their lives with the utmost integrity and honesty,” she says. “The higher up you go in the business world, the harder it is to do the right thing. Having lived through the ‘greed is good’ era, it takes real effort to do this, but there just isn’t any other choice for those of us who made something of themselves but not at the expense of others.”
For Dave, the Petri scholarship will forever reflect his friend’s heart for young people.
“Fred is about the kids who don’t have the best opportunities,” he says. “This is a wonderful, touching gift.”