Holy Cross trustee, one of first women to graduate Georgetown Law, bequeathed school $24M

Photo | Grant Welker College of the Holy Cross in Worcester

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By Grant Welker

The College of the Holy Cross in Worcester has received its largest-ever estate gift: $23.5 million from a former member of the Worcester school's board of trustees, who along with her late husband — a famed lawyer and sports team owner — were generous contributors to the school.

The gift, announced Friday, was given by the estate of the late Agnes Neill Williams, who died March 4, and will launch the start of a new financial aid initiative aiming to raise $40 million for students by June 2022. Her gift will be used to match all new and increased annual gifts to the college in support of financial aid.

Williams was a member of the first class of Georgetown University Law School to graduate women, and she later joined her husband's Washington, D.C. law practice, according to a Holy Cross profile of her.

Williams's husband, the late Edward Bennett Williams, who died in 1988, graduated Holy Cross in 1941 before he moved to Washington D.C. and rose in prominence as a lawyer and later a sports team owner, according to his New York Times obituary. As a lawyer, he represented famed clients like labor union boss Jimmy Hoffa; U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy following his anti-communist hearings; and John Hinckley, Jr., who attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan. Williams would later become part owner and president of the Washington Football Team, and then the majority owner of the Baltimore Orioles.

Following his death, she was asked to join the board of trustees and continued to give to the school. She established the Edward Bennett Williams Fellows Program and later the Agnes N. Williams Fund to help Holy Cross recruit faculty.

The couple's son and granddaughter are also Holy Cross graduates.

The new Hope + Access Campaign for Financial Aid, created with her $23.5-million gift, has a goal of ensuring all students admitted to Holy Cross have an opportunity to attend regardless of financial need.

Holy Cross has been a major fundraiser in the past few years, including for its new newest campus buildings. The Joanne Chouinard-Luth Recreation and Wellness Center is named after Joanne Chouinard-Luth and John Luth, a couple that has donated $40 million to Holy Cross, the most in its history. A $25-million gift from 1956 graduate Neil Prior paved the way for the construction of the Prior Performing Arts Center, which is slated to be complete this fall.