Arthur Zief Passes Away

I thought I'd pass on the tragic news to any USF'ers that Arthur Zief, the name our library bears (well, his wife), passed away over the weekend. He was 89.

Here is a portion of the email sent to us by our school:
I wanted to share with you news that Dean Brand shared with faculty and
staff this past Saturday evening. We were incredibly saddened to learn
that Art Zief passed away this weekend.

Most of you are familiar with the incredible generosity of the Zief
family through not only the contributions to the university and law
school at-large, but in particular, through his contributions to the
Zief Law Library and his generous financial aid endowment which, through
the Zief Scholarship Program, currently supports 75 second and third
year students. For those of you who had the opportunity to personally
meet Mr. Zief, you will recall his incredible passion and vigor, despite
his nearly 90 years of age, for the law school, its mission and its
students.

And, of course, the law school was not his only passion or object of his
incredible philanthropy. Art and Dorraine Zief dedicated themselves to
giving voice as best as possible to the developmentally disabled,
building nine homes and contributing to organizations to promote their
well being. The Arthur Zief Jr. Foundation (named in honor of their
son) carries on this noble work.

I've only had one opportunity to meet Mr. Zief (and his wife) sometime last spring. The school arranged an opportunity for the Art Zief Scholarship recipients (yes, I was one of them) to meet Mr. Zief and his wife to thank him. So, 75 of us piled into Kendrick 100 and, one by one, we went down to thank him and his wife, shake their hands, and tell them a little bit about us and where we wanted to go in our careers. He appeared genuinely interested in listening to all of us and seemed fascinated by our future career plans. To be honest, Mr. Zief wasn't in the best of shape that day, but through all that, he still managed to come out and listen to a bunch of law students.

Indeed, he left a very positive impression with me, and I'm tremendously thankful I got the opportunity to meet him and his wife. They both were very down to earth people and gave selflessly to the community. You will be missed Mr. Zief.