The former New Yorkers have donated $3 million - $1 million in a charitable remainder trust and $2 million through a provision in their estate plans - for an endowment to benefit the NMSU library and the geology department.

Their gift also includes an extensive collection of petrified wood, fossils and other geological artifacts millions of years old, valued at approximately $400,000.

The NMSU New Library, so called since it was built in 1992, has been renamed the Zuhl Library and will showcase a large part of the collection. Many geological artifacts are already on display. A naming ceremony was scheduled for June 16.

Earnings from the Zuhls' endowment will enable the library to acquire more resources and develop new services.

The Zuhls moved from Manhattan to Las Cruces about 10 years ago after decades of traveling the West to collect petrified wood for processing and marketing. It was a business they happily fell into after a chance encounter during a vacation trip 30 years ago.

"The first petrified log we saw was in Arizona," said Herbert Zuhl, who was a chemist in an earlier career. "We saw a gathering of people and went over to see what was happening. They were digging a log out of the ground. We were fascinated and the rancher said, "Why don't you come back and dig one up?""

Now there are Zuhl specimens at the Smithsonian Institution, at a museum in Houston and in homes around the world, polished into table tops and other works of natural art. Their company, Russell-Zuhl Inc., which still operates under that name with different owners, was the first to process very large petrified logs into tabletops and other interior designer pieces, Herbert Zuhl said.

"We'd take a log like this," he said, referring to a 200-million-year-old Arizona pine displayed in the front yard of the Zuhls' home, "and we'd haul it back East and slice it up like French bread and make table tops out of it."

Besides their hardness - it takes a diamond saw to cut them - the petrified logs are gem-like in the colors and unique designs that emerge when they are polished. Other jewels in the Zuhls' collection include mineral specimens, dinosaur bones and eggs, meteorites and fossils of creatures that lived hundreds of millions of years ago.

On one of the couple's trips to the West, Joan decided to visit a cousin in Las Cruces while Herbert went log hunting in Oregon. "I said maybe it's time to think about buying a house," she recalled.

So they did, and the nearness of their house to the NMSU campus was the only connection they had to the university when they began planning their estate and looking for a place to display their collection.

"We have always been interested in promoting education because it is one of the answers to the world's problems," Herbert Zuhl said. "Ron Jordan from the development office provided the ideas and expertise to help us meet our philanthropic goals."

"It has worked out quite well for us," Joan Zuhl said of the relationship they developed with the university.

The feeling is mutual. "This gift is a wonderful example of the way in which private philanthropy can enhance the mission of New Mexico State University," said Joe Creed, interim vice president for university advancement.

R. David Myers, interim dean of the library, said the display of geological artifacts "will work perfectly in the building named for the Zuhls and make the library one of the great showcases of the Southwest." The endowment will provide a "quality margin" for the library, he said.

"The generous contributions of the Zuhls will enable the library to acquire important collections and develop new, cutting edge services that will greatly enhance the education of NMSU students and support important research by university faculty," Myers said.

Karl Hill
 
 

Branding Iron Award winners  Gerald and Jean Thomas, former  NMSU president and first lady,  remain active supporters of the  university.

Gerald and Jean Thomas are the recipients of this year's Branding Iron Award, the highest honor presented by the New Mexico State University Foundation. The former NMSU president and first lady accepted the award at the spring meeting of the foundation's board of directors. The award honors outstanding loyalty, service and support for NMSU. The Thomases were recognized for their many contributions to the growth of the university during Dr. Thomas's 14-year term as president from 1970 to 1984. During those years NMSU gained a worldwide reputation for research and work in global economic development, increased enrollment, expanded the community college program and reorganized the foundation to promote more extensive development efforts. Previously Jean Thomas was honored by the NMSU Board of Regents with a special medal at the 1983 Commencement. The regents cited her for her work as "ambassador, advisor, counselor and worker of all things." At Dr. Thomas's retirement in 1984 the College of Agriculture and Home Economics endowed in his honor a $1 million chair in food production and natural resources. Four years later the college's main building was renamed Gerald Thomas Hall.

Ann Palormo