Old Dominion University’s capital campaign recently received a $5.4 million gift from the estate of Elmer Virginius Williams that will be used primarily by the College of Business and Public Administration. Changing Lives: The Campaign for Old Dominion University, only the second capital campaign in school history, was announced last October with a goal of $100 million. The campaign is designed to provide funding to attract and retain outstanding faculty, bolster student scholarship endowments, enhance campus facilities and offer additional support for university programs.

“Mr. Williams’ generosity to Old Dominion will bring positive benefits to students and faculty for decades to come,” said President Roseann Runte. “His is a lasting legacy for the Hampton Roads community and indeed for the entire commonwealth. We are most grateful for this wonderful gift.”

The gift will be used primarily to support the College of Business and Public Administration, with $400,000 going to the Perry Library. Two chaired professorships will be created with $3 million, the E.V. Williams Chaired Professorship in Marketing and the E.V. Williams Chaired Professorship in Strategic Management. An additional $1 million will be used to support the Center for Real Estate and Economic Development and the final $1 million will provide for faculty research grants, fellowships, stipends and development.

“This generous gift from the estate of E.V. Williams will significantly enhance the national reputation of the College of Business and Public Administration and, most importantly, it will help us to better serve our students and the Hampton Roads community,” said Dean Nancy Bagranoff. “We could not be more delighted.”

Williams, who died in November 2003, attended Old Dominion in the 1930s when it was known as the Norfolk Division. A charter member and past president of the Virginia Road Builders Association, he founded E.V. Williams Inc. in 1941 as a small road construction company and grew it into a major force in the road building and site construction industry of eastern Virginia. The company, which Williams sold to Branch Highways Inc. in 1997, was involved in the concrete paving of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, Virginia’s I-64 and parts of I-95 and I-264, among other projects.