Speaking of his close friend John Pappajohn, the late David Miller said: “He has ambitions to become the greatest philanthropist this state has ever seen. His desire is to earn money and give it away.
Thirty years after the then-West Bank president shared his observations with the Des Moines Register, evidence of Pappajohn’s success in realizing that ambition is spreading across Iowa.
Pappajohn, who died Saturday at his vacation home in Naples, Fla., devoted some $35 million to creating entrepreneurship centers not only at the University of Iowa, his alma mater, but also at the Iowa State University, the University of Northern Iowa, Drake University and the University of North. Iowa Area Community College.
He was also a major donor to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics and, with his wife, Mary, who died last year, established the John and Mary Pappajohn Center for Higher Education in Des Moines.
The Pappajohns have long been among America’s leading collectors of contemporary art and were avid patrons of the Des Moines Art Center. Nowhere is John Pappajohn’s legacy more apparent than the John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park, a 4.4-acre civic treasure, managed by the art center, on which he and his wife spent more than 30 million dollars to share their love of modernist sculpture with the people. from Des Moines.
In doing so, they helped complete the transition of Western Gateway, a once seedy downtown neighborhood, into a symbol of a booming city, a place that has become increasingly attractive to the entrepreneurs Pappajohn has trained and who, in turn, helped him. earn your fortune.
“Their incredible contributions have made this one of the best sculpture parks in the country,” said Jeff Fleming, outgoing director of the Des Moines Art Center. “Everything around has been renovated. This has therefore economically transformed this community, this neighborhood.
Des Moines Mayor Frank Cownie praised the couple’s “love for Des Moines” in a statement.
“The City of Des Moines lost a great friend, a generous benefactor and a beloved member of our community in the passing of John Pappajohn,” Cownie said. “The enormous contribution to Des Moines of the John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park is one of our busiest parks, enjoyed by thousands of visitors each year.”
But the couple’s legacy “goes way beyond their beautiful sculpture park,” Cownie said. “Their mutual love for Des Moines and Iowa is reflected in the dozens of contributions and gifts they have given to communities, hospitals and universities across our state. They will be missed and forever remembered by us grateful and indebted.”
More:How the Pappajohns joined the world’s greatest art collectors
More:The Pappajohns will be honored tonight in New York for their artistic philanthropy
How John Pappajohn Became a Professional Risk Taker
Pappajohn was born in Greece in 1928. He came to America at the age of 9 months with his mother, Maria, following his father, George, to Mason City. He graduated from Mason City High School, then spent six years earning a degree at the University of Iowa.
He got into the insurance business and, after a decade, decided to start his own company, Guardsman Life Insurance, in 1962, traveling the state raising money and building a board of directors.
But Pappajohn, who considered himself a risk-taker, recalled in 2016 that “insurance bored me.” Seven years after founding it, he sold Guardsman to become a venture capitalist.
He started Equity Dynamics, a financial advisory firm, and later founded Pappajohn Capital Resources, a venture capital fund. A self-taught expert in medicine, he has been particularly successful with his investments in medical technology and innovations such as managed care. He was known for being close to the companies he backed, helping them get on the right track and making sure other investors were paid before taking his own profits, earning him invaluable trust.
“When the day of reckoning comes, your legacy, your reputation will be number one,” he told the Register in 2016.
It helped that his instincts were also strong, with only a few missteps ruining his investing career.
“I think I have a gift, a nose, for finding good deals.” Pappajohn said in 1993.
Entrepreneur says Pappajohn investments made his business possible
Dr. Jean Robillard, former vice president for medical affairs at the University of Iowa, credits Pappajohn for giving the company he co-founded, Inseer, a chance for success.
INSEER uses computer vision and machine learning to develop software that prevents, predicts and mitigates injuries in industries ranging from meat processing to healthcare by training employees and modifying workstations .
The idea came from a discussion Robillard had with Pappajohn. The company has now obtained four patents.
Pappajohn has invested in companies that can break down barriers, he said.
“I think he invested in this because of the impact we needed to have and are having. Without that support, this thing wouldn’t have taken off. »
Robillard said Pappajohn’s philanthropy was also an investment, helping to build a culture that could incubate startups like Inseer. Pappajohn has a wing of the UI Hospital and Clinics named after him, and in 2009 he donated $26.4 million to the UI to construct its Biomedical Discovery Building.
He even set up a small sculpture park in front of the UI Children’s Hospital, Robillard said. That and his other donations help UI attract the nation’s top scientists, he said.
“Without the building, without these resources, we would never have been able to develop the diabetes center that we have here, the neuroscience institute that we have here, etc. »
Robillard said Pappajohn’s major legacy is entrepreneurship and how he encouraged people to become entrepreneurs in Iowa.
“We wanted people to be great,” Robillard said. “This was a way to measure that.”
Pappajohn stayed in Iowa and called it the ‘real world’
Known as one of the nation’s leading venture capitalists, Pappajohn, who recognized that Iowa was not Silicon Valley, at one point considered moving to the West Coast. But he stayed put.
Miller, his friend who died in 2021, said, “He has no reason to be in Iowa. He has a strange allegiance to this state. Pappajohn, explaining his attachment to the place where he grew up, said: “It’s the real world, and you know it’s a wonderful place.”
In 1996, when Iowa’s economy was still reeling from the agricultural crisis and its economy, in Pappajohn’s words, was “lower than whale droppings on the bottom of the ocean,” he had a vision to make the state a great place to start new businesses. businesses. He said this led him to provide the funding for “Planting the Seed of Entrepreneurship at Iowa’s Five Colleges.
The centers and their affiliated programs have helped launch thousands of businesses, and he was still giving them until 2021, donating an additional $10 million.
Pappajohn’s impact on entrepreneurship in Iowa cannot be calculated, say those who knew him.
When he helped Iowa State University open its entrepreneurship center in 1996, the university offered an entrepreneurship class. Today, ISU’s Pappajohn Center for Entrepreneurship has more than 100.
“When we opened the center, there weren’t many classes. There weren’t a lot of people studying entrepreneurship,” said Judi Eyles, the center’s director. “He was advocating for entrepreneurs in every way possible in Iowa. I think that’s how he was raised.
At the University of Iowa center, students in disciplines ranging from engineering to journalism take entrepreneurship courses, said David Hensley, its director.
The work Pappajohn did was basic, Hensley and Eyles said. He showed people that entrepreneurship was an option.
After Pappajohn created the five entrepreneurship centers, other colleges and universities expanded their entrepreneurship programs, Hensley said.
“It really helped launch entrepreneurship education in colleges and universities,” Hensley said.
Eventually, thousands of startups would be created from the five centers, he said, and that would show government leaders that entrepreneurship could create businesses and change economies.
“We are a small business state, but entrepreneurship was still present primarily on the coasts. In creating the center, he served as a catalyst for building a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem across the state of Iowa,” he said.
“I don’t think this would have happened without John’s commitment to starting the centers and being a champion of entrepreneurship in Iowa all these years,” Hensley added.
Art Center Director: “They wanted to make an impact, and they did”
Whether it was entrepreneurship, the arts or philanthropy, John and Mary Pappajohn wanted their work to be transformative, said Fleming, director of the Des Moines Art Center.
“They wanted to make an impact, and they did,” Fleming said.
Mary and John Pappajohn had enormous wealth, but they never flaunted it, Eyles and Fleming said.
“They were incredibly humble,” Fleming said. “When you visited them, Mary was obligated to share something with you, whether it was a piece of baklava, a piece of cake or a piece of pie. We couldn’t leave empty-handed. »
Throughout his 80s and 90s, John Pappajohn continued to work. At 88, he described himself as a workaholic, getting up at 5 a.m., arriving at the office at 8 a.m. and returning home at 6 p.m.
Still at age 90, Pappajohn shared with Fleming the same goal that Miller had spoken of three decades earlier: “I keep working so I can give it away.” »
Philip Joens covers retail, real estate and RAGBRAI for the Des Moines Register. He can be reached at 515-284-8184, pjoens@registermedia.com or on Twitter @Philip_Joens.
