Donor Spotlight: Maggie and Clint Spangler

In the late '80s, when UC San Diego's academic and research trajectory was on a sure and steep rise, the university was still finding its voice with the community. Newly arrived La Jolla residents Clint and Maggie Spangler (whose son graduated from UC San Diego) nudged it a bit by contacting the university to set up a charitable remainder trust to support research in cancer, a disease that has ravaged both sides of their family. As Clint recalls, the university didn't quite know what to do with them, so he and Maggie set up the trust on their own.

In the decades since, as the Spanglers have seen their fund grow and as they've worked with more experienced Gift Planning staff, they've expanded their impact by directing the trust to also support research into the brain, and to Birch Aquarium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, where Clint has volunteered for 25 years; he's a weekly presenter at the Kelp Tank. Among Maggie's contributions was an early role in organizing content for UC San Diego's medical library.

Maggie and Clint have also expanded their personal involvement with the "mind-boggling" work going on across campus by serving on boards and frequently volunteering as research subjects, particularly in movement disorders studies. (Greatly impressed by the faculty they've met, they've even bequeathed their bodies to UC San Diego!) Both have essential tremor, a condition that, like cancer, has affected many of their relatives, including their children and grandchildren. Maggie and Clint's return on their extraordinary personal investment in UC San Diego will, it's hoped, be realized by those next generations. That's a legacy.

CRT