Copelands donate $1 million to SLO Children's Museum

By Sally Connell
sconnell@thetribunenews.com

The Copeland Family, former owners of a sports equipment and apparel empire and current downtown developers, have made a $1 million donation to the San Luis Obispo Children’s Museum in honor of the late family matriarch Thelma Copeland.

The donation means the total capital campaign for the construction of the new museum on Monterey Street in downtown San Luis Obispo is closer to reaching its goal, according to museum Executive Director Roy Mueller. The Copelands also made a $100,000 donation to the museum before the old building at the corner of Monterey and Nipomo streets closed in 2004, was demolished, and construction on the new museum began.

The museum directors had hoped to raise $5.2 million for the effort, and will have raised almost 90 percent or $4.6 million including the latest donation of $1 million.

“It’s a wonderful donation both in where we are in our construction, but also where we are in the economy,” Mueller said. He stressed that such large donations have become increasingly rare in the current economic climate.

It is supposed to open in early June.