A loyal friend who keeps on giving

Sen. Hugh Leatherman’s contributions to FMU are continuing — two-and-a-half years after he passed away.

Throughout his 40-year legislative career, and especially during the past two decades when he was chair of the South Carolina Senate’s powerful Finance Committee, the late Hugh Leatherman was as good a friend as Francis Marion University could hope to have, his tireless legislative work ensuring the university had the resources it needed to grow and prosper.

That friendship is continuing — even now, more than two years after Leatherman passed away.

Leatherman’s family recently donated the residual funds from the senator’s campaign account to FMU, as is allowed by state law. The total of $175,129.77 will be used in at least two ways. 

A beginning total of $50,000 has been set aside to create the Jean and Hugh Leatherman International Support Fund, to help pay certain expenses for FMU students traveling abroad to study. 

Another $25,000 will go towards the purchase of a new research vessel for FMU’s Department of Biology, in particular its new Fisheries Science & Management program.

Additional uses for the fund, and particulars of how the international support funding will be distributed, are still under consideration in consultation with the family.

FMU’s President Fred Carter says the gift extends Leatherman’s legacy at FMU.

“Two years after he passes away, Hugh’s still bringing resources to us,” says Carter. “That’s not surprising. This university, in the community he represented for so long in the Senate, was one of his real loves. He made that decision — he and Jean did — before he passed. We’re grateful for what the funds will mean for our students and our faculty, but we’re also happy that Hugh and his many contributions will be remembered in yet another way.”

The Leatherman Science Facility at FMU and the Hugh and Jean Leatherman Medical Complex in downtown Florence are both named for the senator.

Jean Leatherman says there was “never any doubt where remaining campaign funds should be used.

“Hugh Leatherman’s greatest loyalty was to Francis Marion University,” she says. “Hugh and I both grew up in rural areas of the Carolinas with limited resources. His degree in civil engineering touched every facet of his 90 years and propelled a passion for public service. Hugh’s service for 41 years in the South Carolina Senate was perpetually influenced by his friendship with President Fred Carter. No one understands South Carolina government better than President Carter. Their almost daily conversations planned a strategy that still provides success for our region. 

“We are forever grateful that Francis Marion University is dedicated to students from area families that are the first to attend a university. Fred and Folly Carter and Francis Marion University are changing lives one student at a time and one family at a time each day! Our family is proud to support our university, the Carters, the faculty, the staff and especially the students.”

FMU donors have long provided some support for students in need who wished to study abroad. But the funds available were always outstripped by the need. That’s even more true today as FMU’s overseas study opportunities grow with the establishment of its new International Study Centers.

FMU recently launched its fisheries management degree program. It’s part of a significant commitment to studies in ecology and the environment, fueled by the opening of FMU’s new Ecology Center adjacent to a 22-acre lake just north of the university’s main campus. The program has already attracted significant attention. It is well-suited at FMU, given its location in an ecologically diverse region known for its rivers and wetlands, and adjacent to the South Carolina coast.

The new marine studies boat will be permanently docked on the Sampit River at the boardwalk in Georgetown, S.C., a space used jointly by FMU and Coastal Carolina University. 

Dr. Jason Doll, director of the fisheries management program, says the new craft will expand teaching and research opportunities in the lower Great Pee Dee basin and the delta region of the Great Pee Dee River and coastal estuaries. The boat will be used in a variety of courses including Ichthyology, Fisheries Science and Management, Ornithology, Entomology, and Water Resources. 

“All of these opportunities in classes will give students an immersive experience as they explore the natural history, ecology, and hydrology of coastal rivers and estuaries,” says Doll. “The pontoon boat will bring new research opportunities such as evaluating environmental water and sediment samples for contaminants, surveying fish with a variety of nets, and evaluating the hydrology of this unique system.”