28 Facts About Pleasant Rowland

Pleasant T Rowland was born on Pleasant Williams Thiele; March 8,1941 and is an American educator, reporter, writer, entrepreneur and philanthropist.

Pleasant Rowland is known for her philanthropic work in the arts in Madison, Wisconsin and her efforts to redevelop historic properties in Aurora, New York.

Pleasant Rowland was born in Chicago and grew up in Bannockburn, a suburb north of Chicago.

Pleasant Rowland is the oldest of three sisters and a brother.

Pleasant Rowland's father was Edward M Thiele, a Chicago advertising executive who was president of the Leo Burnett ad agency from 1961 to 1971.

Pleasant Rowland was an on-air reporter and anchor for KGO-TV, the San Francisco ABC affiliate, from 1968 to 1971.

Pleasant Rowland left the news industry to work as director of product development at the publishing company.

Pleasant Rowland was involved in writing and publishing children's textbooks in Boston, Massachusetts from 1971 to 1978.

Pleasant Rowland created a comprehensive language-arts program called Beginning to Read, Write, and Listen.

Pleasant Rowland developed the Addison-Wesley Reading Program until the project was shelved in 1981.

Pleasant Rowland was in town for a press check on the first printing of her language-arts program at Webcrafters, a family-owned printing firm.

Pleasant Rowland had saved $1.2 million from textbook royalties and invested the majority of those savings into the project.

Pleasant Rowland worked with Valerie Tripp, a close friend and colleague from Addison-Wesley, to develop characters for the first line of dolls.

In 2002, Pleasant Rowland described her belief in the importance of the whole package :.

In July 2000, Pleasant Rowland retired as a Mattel board member and as president of American Girl.

In 2001, Pleasant Rowland purchased retailer MacKenzie-Childs, based in Aurora, NY, from Victoria MacKenzie-Childs and Richard MacKenzie-Childs.

In 2008, Pleasant Rowland sold MacKenzie-Childs to the part owners of Twin Lakes Capital Lee Feldman and Howard Cohen.

In September 2010, Pleasant Rowland received an honorary doctorate from Edgewood College in Madison, Wisconsin.

Pleasant Rowland has received honorary degrees from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and University of Hartford.

In press accounts, Pleasant Rowland expressed her vision of enhancing the historic character and attractiveness of the community and improving the local economy.

Pleasant Rowland promised to collaborate with the community to promote economic growth.

Six years later, her promise is unfilled and Pleasant Rowland remains inaccessible and unresponsive.

Pleasant Rowland supported the Chicago Botanic Gardens with a $5 million gift to establish Evening Island in 1999, the second largest of the Botanic Garden islands.

Pleasant Rowland dedicated the gift and the project to her father, Edward Thiele.

In 2019, Pleasant Rowland pledged $20 million to build the Madison Youth Arts Center Opened in 2021, the MYArts building is intended to provide space for performing and visual youth arts groups.

In 2021, Pleasant Rowland donated $10 million toward the construction of a new transplant clinic at UW Hospital.

Pleasant Rowland received a kidney transplant at the hospital in 2012.

Pleasant Rowland donated $1 million for Madison's Black Business Hub in 2021.