On Oct. 6, 1880, the University of Southern California (USC) was founded. USC traces its origins to Judge Robert Maclay Widney who in 1878 formed a board of trustees and secured a donation of 308 lots of land from three prominent community leaders ﾗ Ozro W. Childs, a Protestant horticulturist; former California governor John G. Downey, an Irish-Catholic pharmacist and businessman; and Isaias W. Hellman, a German-Jewish banker and philanthropist. The gift provided land for a campus as well as a source of endowment, the seeds of financial support for the nascent institution.