Ourworld
‘An Unwavering Commitment’—Honored in Stone Barry Perry’68, joined by his wife, Janice, daughter Kimberly Perry, granddaughters Alix Perry Madden and Chase Madden Perry and son-in-law Brian Madden, celebrates the re-dedication of the UMass Lowell Engineering Building with plastics engineering students, faculty and staff.
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When last we visited with Barry Perry ’68, two years ago in the pages of this magazine, he was setting off on a fishing trip to Belize with his about-to-be 40-year-old middle daughter. This time when we called, it was his youngest daughter’s turn to hit 40, and the trip—her choice—would be down the Colorado River on a raft. “It’s a tradition,“ he explains. “All three of my girls, on their 40th, I try to do something really special.” Doing special things for people—daughters, companies, UMass Lowell students—has become, for Perry, a tradition in itself. The son of a prison guard father and a textile worker mother, Perry says his Lowell Tech education was possible only through scholarship aid. He is now six years retired from his job as CEO of a $5 billion chemical firm. It’s a very active retirement. In addition to the fishing and rafting with his daughters—and the quail hunting and target shooting he finds time to do for himself—he travels the country as director on four corporate boards, spends at least as much time on the phone on those companies’ behalf (“it’s the best way I know to keep your head in the game”), and—increasingly, as time goes by— contributes an ever-larger portion of his wealth to assuring that young, qualified engineering students aren’t denied access to a UMass Lowell education.
UMASS LOWELL MAGAZINE S P R I N G 2 0 1 2
By Geoffrey Douglas
His latest contributions are his largest to date. In October, he pledged $1.25 million to the University for renovations to the Engineering Building, support for the new Emerging Technologies and Innovation Center and funding to double the size of his endowed scholarship fund. In appreciation of this latest gift, on April 19 the University renamed the engineering building Perry Hall in his honor. “Since 1952, this building has been at the forefront of innovation and industry in Lowell, first as a laboratory and classroom space for students in the paper and leather engineering fields, and later, in chemical engineering and biomanufacturing,” said Chancellor Marty Meehan at the event. “Today, we celebrate a new beginning. Under the Perry Hall name, the building will be a catalyst for student achievement in engineering and fields we can only imagine.” Achievement is something Perry knows about. After growing up in Dartmouth, Mass. (he now lives in Newtown, Penn.,), he earned his bachelor’s degree in plastics engineering at what was then Lowell Technological Institute. He began his career at General Electric and retired in 2006 as the chairman and CEO of New Jersey-based Engelhard Corp., a chemical and metals company.