On July 12, 2000, a sixty-year-old business school, formerly known as the College of Business Administration at the University of Houston, received the largest up-front award to any single college in the history of the university. Eighty-one year-old Charles T. “Ted” Bauer endowed the college with a gift of $40 million. The business school took his name, becoming the C.T. Bauer College of Business. “I wanted to give a gift to the City of Houston that would assure the steady growth of its business community. The Bauer College has flowered into a true alma mater – “nourishing mother” - energizing the university with new vigor, depth and richness implied in the words.
After graduating from Harvard and serving in the air force in World War II, Ted Bauer worked as a securities analyst on Wall Street and at night attended business school at New York University. As a naval aviator, he first came to Texas in 1942 for cadet flight training during World War II, marking the beginning of his life-long relationship with the State of Texas.
In his fifties, he co-founded AIM Investments in Houston. He served as Chairman of AIM Funds until September 2000 and Chairman of AIM Management until January 2001. His energy inspired the men and women at AIM Investments to create the seventh largest mutual fund business in the world. At the time of his gift to Bauer College, over 400 AIM employees were graduates of the University of Houston, and were critically important to AIM’s success.
Ted is not highly visible in the public eye. His name doesn’t appear in the society pages. Though a billionaire, he remains in the same Houston home he bought almost thirty years ago. Ted was irritated when Forbes listed him among the 400 Richest Americans in 2001. “Now,” he complained, “everybody will think my living room is full of money.” |
