MOUNT VERNON — Local donors have played critical roles in building a new theater and renovating an arts facility that Cornell College will dedicate at 3 p.m. Friday, Oct. 17, as the final projects in a $16.3 million fine arts campaign.
Kimmel Theatre is Cornell’s new 266-seat, state-of-the-art venue for stage productions and lectures. Armstrong Hall, built in 1938, reopened this fall after renovations to modernize it for music and theater. Last fall Cornell dedicated McWethy Hall for art.
Lead donor in the arts campaign is Cedar Rapids’ Hall-Perrine Foundation, which awarded Cornell a $3 million challenge grant. The foundation, in its 50th year, has awarded a total of $7 million to Cornell over the last 25 years, including $3 million for renovations to Cornell’s Cole Library, which also serves as Mount Vernon’s public library.
The late and highly regarded industrialist Howard Hall established the Hall Foundation to support educational, charitable, religious, scientific and literary purposes. The foundation has a long commitment to the area’s private colleges.
Major support for the arts campaign also came from the estate of 1932 alumnus Ronald Fleming and 1933 alumna Winifred Plumb Fleming. The campaign received $1 million of a total estate gift of $2.3 million. The Plumb-Fleming Studio Theatre is the new black box theater in Armstrong.
Ronald earned a degree in music and was bandmaster for many eastern Iowa schools, including the Maquoketa Valley Community School at Delhi where he was director of instrumental music. Winifred earned a degree in English and participated in orchestra and the dramatic arts and wrote for the college’s renowned literary magazine, “The Husk.” She later trained in art and music at Coe College and the University of Iowa. She taught English and dramatics for several years. Ronald died in 1996, Winifred in 1999.