Wartburg College has received a $1.5 million gift to enhance the living and learning community – the residential campus learning environment – for students.

The Franklin I. and Irene List Saemann Foundation made the gift commitment as part of the college’s pending comprehensive campaign, “Transforming Tomorrow.”

It includes a $1 million challenge grant toward the $8 million renovation of Clinton Hall. The grant serves to motivate other alumni and friends to make gifts and pledges totaling $1 million or more toward the project before the campaign’s public launch in October.

Built in 1958, Clinton Hall, which houses about half of the college’s first-year class, has not changed substantially since the addition of the south wing in 1965. Updates will include a classroom, tiered theater and faculty apartment with a goal of creating an innovative environment that fosters mentoring and promotes collaboration. The project will be funded through private gift support.

The makeover is the first step in implementing Wartburg’s campus master plan and will be foundational in providing outstanding teaching, learning and living infrastructure – one of the goals of the college’s strategic plan.

 “The Saemann Foundation is pleased to be able to help enhance the living and learning opportunities for students at Wartburg College,” said Joann Kilgus, trustee of the Saemann Foundation.

“Ever since Franklin and Irene Saemann visited the college in the 1970s, Wartburg has been blessed by their generosity,” said President Darrel Colson. “The campus has been beautified and generations of students served by the gifts that they made, not only during their lives but through the foundation that continued making gifts after they were no longer with us.”

The Saemann Foundation, established in 1983, has made nearly $7 million in gifts and pledges to Wartburg, many of which supported building projects directly benefiting students like Grossmann Hall (1995), Vogel Library (1999) and Saemann Student Center (2004). Other grants from the foundation focused on enhancing student life, academic excellence and strategic planning.

“I’m also thankful the board of the Saemann Foundation has continued to support the philanthropic interests of ‘Uncle Frank and Aunt Irene,’” Colson said.

Irene List Saemann was the granddaughter of Pastor Georg Grossmann, Wartburg’s founder. Members of the Saemann Foundation Board with strong ties to Wartburg include Joann Kilgus, great-granddaughter of Grossmann and former member of the Wartburg Board of Regents; Amy Kilgus Chamley, great-great-granddaughter of Grossmann and member of the Wartburg Board of Regents; Adam Kilgus, great-great-grandson of Grossmann and member of the Wartburg West National Advisory Board; and Robert List, great-great-grandson of Grossmann and father of 2003 Wartburg graduate Alena List Bauman. Other members of the Saemann Foundation include great-granddaughter June Waller and great-great grandchildren Jonathan Waller and Katherine Kauffman.

For more information on the challenge grant or the Transforming Tomorrow campaign, contact the Wartburg College Development Office at 319-352-8495.