White, John Hazen and Mary Tefft White (JHW 1913-2001; MTW 1916-2009)
Role: benefactorsDates:
Portrait Location: Taubman 59 Charlesfield 104
Artist: Villetti, Gina ()
Portrait Date: 2002
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions:
Framed Dimensions: 36 1/2" x 32 1/2"
Brown Portrait Number: 281
Brown Historical Property Number: 0
The White family has had a profound impact on education in the state of Rhode Island. John Hazen White, Sr., a Yale English major who at one point entertained hopes of entering the ministry, responded to his father Elwood's sudden death by taking over the family's Thermal Appliance Company in 1942 at the age of 29. Over the years, he and his team of managers built the company into the prosperous Taco Industries, now located in Cranston, RI. John Hazen White, Sr., and his wife, Mary Tefft White, called Happy, made it a priority to invest in the education of Rhode Islanders. Prior to his death in 2001, the couple endowed such educational centers as the University of Rhode Island's John Hazen White, Sr. Center for Ethics and Public Service and Johnson and Wales University's John Hazen White School of Arts and Sciences. The Whites were generous to Brown University as well, funding their Public Opinion Lab, as well as dissertation fellowships, a lecture series, and a senior and junior professorship in Political Science and Public Policy. Following her husband's death in 2001, Happy White continued the family tradition of philanthropy, endowing Roger Williams University, her alma mater (she earned her B.A. at the age of 60), with an arts center, and making a similar gift to Johnson and Wales University. The portrait of the Whites was painted by Gina Villetti in 2002. Since the painting is a posthumous representation of John Hazen White, Sr., the artist worked from photographs in order to picture him. Villetti was a longtime member of the Providence art community. She now lives and paints in California.