Columbia Sportswear moguls Gert and Tim Boyle

by Anne Burnett, MS '98

Columbia Sportswear President Tim Boyle, '71, has donated $25,000 to the School of Journalism and Communication to help transform Allen Hall's reading room into the Bill Winter Presentation Room.

Boyle's contribution will be added to those of four other people who are former students of the popular advertising professor: Bruce Cappelli, '76, Patty and Steve O'Leary, '69, and Rich Jernstedt, '69. The room will feature state-of-the-art projection and sound systems along with many of Winter's awards and photos. The new room will be a place where students can learn and practice client presentation skills.

It was during Boyle's senior year at the University of Oregon's School of Journalism in 1970 that his father, Neal, died suddenly of a heart attack. Before he could finish school, his mother, Gert, enlisted his immediate help. Together they led the Portland-based company from near-bankruptcy to become a world leader in the active outdoor apparel industry. Now, Tim Boyle is CEO and his mother is Columbia's 74-year-old chairman of the board.

Today, Columbia Sportswear employs more than 1,100 people around the world and distributes products through more than 10,000 retailers. Married and the father of two, Boyle has enjoyed both personal and commercial success.

You get an inkling of where Boyle's own sense of commitment and determination comes from when you understand his parents' history. The young couple fled Germany to escape the Nazis, resettled in Portland and purchased a small hat distributorship prior to manufacturing products themselves.

In 1992, Boyle realized he had some important unfinished business--completing his B.A. degree. He contacted the School and discovered that, when he hurriedly left School in that spring of 1970, he had completed all but one unit for his degree. He returned to the School of Journalism and Communication to do a special project and became an official graduate.