'Boone admired President Reagan because he had the ability to relate to everybody'
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FIRST ON FOX - The foundation of the late T. Boone Pickens presented a $21 million gift to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum today, cementing a bond of friendship, patriotism and faith in the American people shared by both the philanthropist and the former president.
"It's a hugely generous and exciting gift," David Trulio, president and CEO of the Reagan Library in Simi, California, told Fox News Digital.
"It is part of the arc of incredible generosity that Mr. Pickens has expressed toward us over the years and to many other institutions."
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The two organizations believe the gift will help perpetuate for future generations the values and policies that made Reagan one of the most popular politicians in American history.
"Boone admired President Reagan because he had the ability to relate to everybody," Jay Rosser, director of the T. Boone Pickens Foundation in Dallas, Texas, told Fox News Digital.
T. Boone Pickens (1928-2019), chairman and chief executive officer at BP Capital, smiles during a television interview during the Skybridge Alternatives (SALT) conference in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Wednesday, May 11, 2016. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
"You may not have agreed with his politics, but at the end of day you appreciated the president’s passion and his commitment to the cause of the United States."
The Pickens donation to the Reagan Library is expected to be the last charitable gift from the foundation, said Rosser.
"It's a hugely generous and exciting gift." — David Trulio, president and CEO of the Reagan Library
The donation represents a nearly 10% boost to the Reagan Library’s $246 million endowment. It comes in addition to a $10 million gift Pickens made to the Reagan Library nearly 20 years ago. That gift was used to open the library's centerpiece Air Force One Pavilion in 2005.
FOX Business will be hosting the second Republican primary debate in the Air Force One Pavilion on September 27.
President Reagan, right, with T. Boone Pickens and his then-wife Beatrice Pickens, at the "President's Dinner," which benefits the House and Senate Republican campaign committees (Courtesy T. Boone Pickens Foundation)
The pavilion's Boeing 707 served as Air Force One for President Reagan, and six other presidents, from 1973 to 2001, and will provide a stunning backdrop for the debate.
Reagan flew 660,000 miles around the world on the aircraft during a transformational presidency from 1981 to 1989.
His optimistic policies and sunny persona forged America’s economic re-emergence after the "malaise" of the 1970s.
He also inspired a new sense of national pride and patriotism, and marshaled global forces to topple communism in 1989 and earn victory for the United States and western democratic nations in the Cold War.
The Air Force One Pavilion at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum will host the FOX Business Republican primary debate on Sept.27, 2023. (Steve Whitaker Photography)
Reagan's ability to deftly sell his vision to the nation with a rare mix of unapologetic American muscularity and personal humility earned him the nickname the Great Communicator.
He used those skills to pass laws working with a House of Representatives controlled by Democrats throughout his presidency, and to build a powerful political coalition of various interests around the nation that fueled two landslide election victories.
"Boone admired President Reagan because he had the ability to relate to everybody." - Jay Rosser
Reagan easily defeated sitting president, Democrat Jimmy Carter, in 1980, winning 44 of 50 states.
He proved even more popular in the 1984 election, winning 49 of 50 states.
Ronald Reagan is shown making his famous challenge to Mikhail Gorbachev to "tear down" the Berlin Wall in June 1987. (Getty Images)
Pickens, a native of Oklahoma, founded in 1957 what would become Mesa Petroleum, turning it into one of the nation's top independent natural gas and oil companies.
The business executive's national profile rose with the Reagan ascendancy and economic boom of the 1980s.
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He launched a period of daring acquisitions, typically of larger companies, and became a household name and legend of the business world in the 1980s.
He founded BP Capital Management in 1997 and in 2008 launched the Pickens Plan to advocate for alternative energy sources beyond petroleum.
T. Boone Pickens, center, with former first lady Nancy Reagan, left, and Madeleine Pickens. The businessman donated $10 million to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in 2005 that funded its Air Force One Pavillon. His foundation has now given the Reagan Library a new $21 million donation. (Courtesy Ronald Reagan Presidential Library)
Pickens used his wealth to become one of the nation's most generous philanthropists.
He established the T. Boone Pickens Foundation in 2006, which has donated more than $1.1 billion to date to causes and institutions around the country.
Pickens died in 2019.
"Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall." — President Ronald Reagan
While Pickens was proving the power of American capitalism, President Reagan was fighting to protect it.
He famously issued a demand for economic and personal freedom in the shadows of the Iron Curtain in West Berlin on June 12, 1987.
President Reagan in 1982, at the Durenberger Republican convention rally. (Universal History Archive/Getty Images)
"Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate," Reagan demanded of Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev, before a massive crowd in a city divided by the Berlin Wall.
"Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall."
It stands perhaps as the signature moment of Reagan's public life and presidency, a clarion call for human freedom and one of the most dramatic acts of statesmanship in global history.
The Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum continues to stand up to dictatorial forces today, said Trulio.
A memorial at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library honors Board of Trustees member, benefactor and businessman T. Boone Pickens. (Courtesy Reagan Presidential Library)
The library angered China's communist leaders when it hosted and welcomed words from Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen in April.
Officials in the People's Republic of China condemned the visit and sanctioned the library.
"We will always stand up for democracy and self-determination," said Trulio, honoring the spirit of the library namesake.
The $21 million gift from the T. Boone Pickens Foundation will be used to promote Reagan’s "timeless legacy," said the CEO, as well as the foundational values Reagan championed both in his private and public life.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., right, along with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen deliver statements to the press after a Bipartisan Leadership Meeting at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, on April 5, 2023. China’s military sent several dozen warplanes and 11 warships toward Taiwan in a display of force directed at the self-ruled island, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said on April 10, after China launched large-scale military drills in retaliation for a meeting between the House of Representatives speaker and Taiwan's president. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu, File)
These values, he said, are individual liberty, economic opportunity, global democracy and national pride.
Among other efforts, the GE-Reagan Foundation Scholarship provides up to $400,000 in college assistance to 10 high school seniors from around the nation each year.
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The "high achievement" recipients this year were culled from a competitive pool of 16,000 applicants.
The Reagan Library also educates nearly 400,000 visitors each year, making it the most popular presidential library in the nation, according to several sources, while offering a variety of other forums, events and educational resources each year.
"I know in my heart that man is good … and there is purpose and worth to each and every life." — President Reagan
"Boone was really a treasured member of our Board of Trustees and served as a trusted advisor to Mrs. Reagan while he was on the board," said Trulio.
"He had high confidence in the purpose of the Reagan Library and Museum — and with his last major gift he's trusting us to promote those values."
T. Boone Pickens, left, and President Ronald Reagan. The T. Boone Pickens Foundation donated $21 million to the Reagan Presidential Library in 2023. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg and Universal History Archive via Getty Image)
The $21 million gift will support the faith in the American people and the nation's future that Pickens shared with Reagan, said Rosser of the T. Boone Pickens Foundation.
That joint faith is expressed on the president's memorial at the library, where he was laid to rest in 2004.
"I know in my heart that man is good, that what is right will always eventually triumph and there is purpose and worth to each and every life," said Reagan.
Kerry J. Byrne is a lifestyle reporter with Fox News Digital.
