Key people involved in making the Curry County Campus a reality are, from left, Dave Bridgham, Wayne Krieger, Peggy Goergen, Patty Scott, Janet Pretti and Cherie Mitchell. The Pilot/Charles Kocher

Sometimes one good surprise deserves another.

As the celebrations for the new Curry Campus started Thursday, Southwestern Oregon Community College officials planned one surprise: naming the community room of the new building in honor of State Rep. Wayne Krieger.

But a lost letter finally delivered by the Post Office Thursday contained another surprise for college officials: a $250,000 donation toward the project.

SWOCC President Dr. Patty Scott made both announcements at a special dinner for major donors and supporters, served in the commons of the new campus. 

They were highlights in a project that has been a struggle over many years, she said.

“I had to focus on the end result,” she said, “so on many sleepless nights, I thought about this night.”

When Scott was appointed interim president in October 2008, the college board had just fired her predecessor, the college did not yet own the land being donated for the Brookings project, and the college money for the project had been spent for other uses.  There was, Scott said, “a mountain to climb.

“Thank you all for helping us, and me, to the end,” she said. “Dreams do come true; visions do come true.”

Krieger’s work to secure funding, several times, was the reason the college board voted this week to name the community room in his honor.

Krieger said he had made the project a priority in working with other legislators, and getting the funds was the product of having working relationships in Salem.

Direct state funding included $1 million in 2001, another $2.3 million in matching funds in 2005, and $400,000 in 2011.

Thursday was his first visit to the Curry Campus since it opened for classes earlier this month, and he called the result “impressive.”

“It’s twice the size I thought it was going to be,” he said, “and it’s more beautiful than I thought it was going to be.”

The surprise donation was a check for $85,000 from the Mildred and Harvey Mudd Foundation, with a promise of four more checks over the next four years.

But the check, sent to the old Brookings Center on Alder Street after the staff moved to the new campus, was delayed in the mail until it showed up on the Coos Bay Campus Thursday morning.

The Mudd Foundation has family ties to the Bandon area, SWOCC officials said.

Karen Pringle, director of the SWOCC Foundation, outlined the other major gifts for the Curry Campus, including:

•The 10-acre site donated by U.S. Borax (now Rio Tinto) in its planned Lone Ranch development, valued at $1.3 million.

•$300,000 from the Ford Family Foundation of Roseburg.

•$200,000 from the Meyer Memorial Trust, founded by the estate of Fred Meyer.

•$25,000 from the Curry County Board of Realtors.

•$25,000 from the Chandler Foundation on behalf of the Curry Coastal Pilot. 

•$25,000 from the Dyer Partnership engineering firm of Coos Bay. 

•$25,000 from 101-year-old Margaret Dean of Bandon.

•$25,000 from Freeman Marine of Gold Beach on behalf of founders Ed Freeman and Bob Sutton.

•$5,000 from the Gordon Elwood Foundation of Medford.

The latest donations meant that furnishings, fixtures and equipment could be purchased without using any college general fund revenues from taxes or tuition.

“We appreciate every level, and every capacity,” Pringle said.

Scott also had praise for the SWOCC board, which has made the Curry Campus project a priority for many years. All of the board members attended the Thursday night dinner, including Board President David Bridgham, Harry Abel, Rick Howell, Marcia Jensen, Julie Kremers, Cherie Mitchell and Susan Anderson.