Hutton Honors College

See a Video about Edward L. Hutton. In the fall of 2004, Indiana University Bloomington named its Honors College for Edward L. Hutton, an IU alumnus and a prominent philanthropist and businessman from Cincinnati, Ohio. Hutton, chairman of Chemed Corp. in Cincinnati and chairman of Omnicare Inc., grew up near Bloomington in the town of Bedford, Ind., during the Depression. After earning bachelor's and master's degrees from IU, he served in the U.S. Army in Germany. After the war, he worked in Berlin in the occupational government's Export/Import Division, negotiating trade agreements with several countries to help rebuild the German economy.

"The experience profoundly changed my life, so much so that I've always held that those years of living and working abroad were the key to my development as a person and success as a businessman," Hutton has said.

In 2003, Hutton gave $9 million to IU to establish an endowment for the International Experiences Program. IU subsequently named the program for him. The university is matching the interest income from his gift in accordance with an initiative that provides matching funds for new gifts of scholarships and fellowships for the IU Bloomington campus.

"Ed Hutton has added new meaning to President Herman Wells' statement that the campus of Indiana University is not just in Bloomington, not just in Indiana or in the United States, but extends around the globe," said then IU President Adam W. Herbert. "He has helped our students become citizens of the world, and for that he has our enduring gratitude."

On behalf of students, faculty and staff in the Hutton Honors College, then Dean Karen Hanson extended appreciation for his generous support.

"He has had the vision and the generosity that have been crucial for the development of the Honors College and that will be central to our evolving goals," Hanson said. "Public universities, including IU, can be the cradle of what Thomas Jefferson called 'the natural aristocracy,' the grounds of which were not wealth and privilege but virtue and talents. Mr. Hutton himself is proof of that Jeffersonian faith, achieving what he did through talent and hard work, and now he is giving opportunities for development and achievement to others."

After his Army service, Hutton moved to New York, continuing to work in international trade. In 1951, he joined W.R. Grace & Co., where he became a senior officer and director. Returning to the Midwest in the 1970s, Hutton became president, chief executive officer and eventually chairman of Chemed and Omnicare, which is the leading firm in the United States supplying pharmaceuticals to nursing home patients.

The beneficiary of an IU scholarship and of mentoring from caring faculty members, Hutton has been generous in funding other student scholarships and endowed faculty professorships at IU through the IU Foundation. He also chaired the IU Foundation's volunteer fund-raising committee that raised $23 million for the Herman B Wells Scholars Program in the 1980s. Hutton received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from IU in 1992 and the IU Foundation's Herman B Wells Visionary award in 2002.

The Hutton Honors College recruits diverse, talented and highly motivated students. It offers a range of small, challenging courses along with a variety of extracurricular and service programs. These opportunities, which include a close working relationship with some of IU's top faculty, affirm IU's commitment to providing students with both the intimacy of a small college and the breadth of a large research institution.

The Edward L. Hutton International Experiences Program was started in 2000 as a pilot project of the Honors College, and has been part of the Honors College Undergraduate Grant Program since it began. The program assists with costs for travel and living expenses for IU Bloomington students so they can study abroad or get involved in service projects and internships outside the United States. It is a year-round program. Since its inception, more than 4,000 students have benefited from the program. The Honors College plans to enable 600 students annually to incorporate international experiences into their academic programs.