$17.4 Million Left to Caltech by Alumnus

Caltech announced Tuesday that it has received $17.4 million from the estate of the late William D. Hacker, an alumnus of the university who retired early and who lived frugally despite accumulating a fortune in the stock market.

Hacker, who died in February at 91, specified that nearly half of his bequest be used to advance the study of economics, including endowing a professorship in his name in economics and management.

Another large chunk of the gift will help construct the Broad Center for Biological Sciences, named after developer-philanthropist Eli Broad, who donated $20 million last year. About $1 million from Hacker’s estate will set up a revolving fund that will offer low-interest loans to Caltech students.

Hacker, who was raised in Monrovia and then lived in Hollywood Hills, earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Caltech in 1931. Following a professor’s advice, he went on to earn a master’s degree at Harvard Business School.

During World War II, Hacker served under Gen. Robert Wood Johnson and, because of the connection, became a stockholder of the general’s firm, Johnson & Johnson, said his nephew, Richard W. Buck.

Hacker worked as an executive for the American Pencil Co. and later for a sewing machine company before retiring at 43 to manage his stock portfolio.

“He was an incredibly savvy investor,” Buck said. “Yet he lived a very frugal life.”

Hacker and his late wife, Barbara, bought their house in Hollywood Hills for about $30,000 in 1954. He lived in it until he died. Barbara Hacker died in 1993, and they had no children. In the end, Hacker had accumulated about $25 million in Johnson & Johnson stock as part of an overall estate worth about $60 million.

Caltech is the largest beneficiary of the Hacker estate. Other beneficiaries include the Huntington Medical Research Institutes in Pasadena; Thunderbird, the American Graduate School of International Management, in Glendale, Ariz., where Hacker used to teach; the Harvard Business School; and Miss Porter’s School, a Connecticut prep school for girls that Hacker’s wife once attended.