NEWS BRIEFS
Hits keep coming
Add the African Studies Web site to Penn's list of Web winners. The site, which the Library of Congress has called "the most comprehensive on-line source for information about Africa," passed a major milestone in March when it received over a million page requests, or "hits," for the month.
Students and faculty in African Studies celebrated the occasion with a party honoring the site's developer and webmaster, African Studies Center Outreach Coordinator Ali B. Ali-Dinar (Gr'95), on April 13.
Big winner
Thomas J. Sugrue has won a prestigious 1998 Bancroft Prize for his book "The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit." The prizes, awarded annually by Columbia University, were presented April 8 and carry a $4,000 prize for each winner. Other recipients were Christine Leigh Heyrman for "Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt" and Walter LaFeber for "The Clash: U.S.-Japanese Relations Throughout History." Sugrue, an assistant professor of history, found that the decline of Detroit and other northern cities began during the seemingly prosperous 1940s, and that the effects of job loss were compounded by intense racial conflict over housing.
$10 million gift
The Wharton School received $10 million from Taiwanese businessman Chen Fu Koo and his two sons, Chester Koo and Leslie Koo, building on a family tradition of generosity toward Wharton that included endowing two professorships. The gift will go toward a new building incorporating the latest in educational and communications technology.
Chen Fu, who founded one of the largest financial and industrial groups in Taiwan, received an honorary doctor of laws degree here in 1992 for his work towards encouraging economic cooperation in the Pacific Basin. Previously, he had been awarded the Wharton School's Dean's Medal. His sons received M.B.A.s from Wharton.