Giving a Geyser

Some men bid for immortality with a simple statue or park bench that bears their name, or by endowing a university chair or a foundation. Not George T. Delacorte. The 76-year-old founder of the Dell Publishing Co. seeks to perpetuate his memory in a more spectacular way: through a series of monuments, each splashier than the last. The splashiest to date is the Delacorte Geyser at the tip of Manhattan's Welfare Island, which was tested last week for the first time.

Its cost--$350,000--was high. But then so is the fountain, which is designed to shoot a steady stream of water 600 ft. up into the air. It is, in fact, the highest in the world. (Switzerland's Jet d'Eau, rising 426 ft. out of Lake Geneva, provided the inspiration.)

Despite the extravagant quality of Delacorte's "gift to the city," the city was somewhat less than grateful. The New York Times cited crucial needs that the money might have better served, instead of going "literally down the drain," and wrote off the donor as "the wrong-way Corrigan of New York philanthropy." Delacorte paid no mind. "The fountain," he said last week, "is my greatest landmark."

Some might disagree. Delacorte's Alice in Wonderland statue, built as a tribute to his late wife in 1959, is so popular a children's roosting spot in Central Park that it requires some $10,000 per year for maintenance. The Delacorte Theater, completed with the aid of $150,000 from the philanthropist, is the site of New York's annual free Shakespeare festival. Another Delacorte gift, the Central Park Zoo's animated clock, is designed in the form of an animal carrousel. As its base revolves to glockenspiel music, the clock chimes one of 32 nursery rhymes on the quarter-hour and sends a comical beast dancing every half hour.

Delacorte, a self-made millionaire, has six children and 20 grandchildren who are well-provided for, he says, in his wife's will; he himself believes that "leaving money to a child hurts more than it helps." The controversy over his fountain notwithstanding, he plans to continue his donations to the city he loves. "I was born and raised in New York," he says, "made my money in New York, and now I want to give my money back to New York."

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