Henry L. Foster, 83, a former University trustee whose donations to the University made a lasting impact on the Rose Art Museum and on scientific research at Brandeis, died at home last Tuesday of cancer, according to University President Jehuda Reinharz. The funeral took place last Wednesday, according to an article in the Boston Globe. Foster is survived by his wife, Lois Foster and his three sons John Foster '75, James Foster and Neal Foster, according to a University press release.

Reinharz said Foster served on the Board of Trustees for 35 years starting in 1973 and served as Chairman of the Board from 1979 to 1985. He received an honorary degree from Brandeis in 1975.

"Henry Foster was a model trustee in many ways, kind and interested in everybody regardless of their station in life," Reinharz recalled. "A real gentleman who deeply cared about the people and the institutions he supported."

John Foster emphasized how much his father "loved and admired" President Reinharz. "When [Reinharz] first came to Brandeis, my dad really befriended him; they both sought each other's advice," he said.

Reinharz said Foster graduated from Middlesex Veterinary College in 1946, an institution that previously existed on Brandeis' current campus. "We inherited that campus, and so I assume that the initial attraction to [Foster] was the fact that this was in a sense a continuation in some remote sense of the school he had gone to," Reinharz said.

Henry Foster, who served as CEO of Charles River Laboratories, which provides laboratory services for the pharmaceutical, medical device and biotechnology industries, knew a past chairman of the Board of Trustees, Jacob Hiatt, and started supporting the biomedical sciences at Brandeis, his son John Foster said. "His further interest was in the Rose Art Museum, which was the passion of my mother."

In 1975 Foster and his wife Lois raised funds to establish the Lois and Henry Foster Biomedical Research Lab.

The Foster Biomedical Research Lab provides housing for about 6,000 mice and space for 20 researchers, the lab's director Prof. Kenneth Hayes (BIO) said.

Hayes noted that nutritional studies Hayes conducted on mice led his lab to develop the Smart Balance spread, a trans-fat free margarine. He added that the Fosters provided support for two undergraduate summer interns in the lab during the time of that research.

Hayes emphasized the ongoing interest Foster displayed in the lab. "Over the 25 years I've been here, when he was on campus for other meetings, he would often stop by and visit with me and want to know what was going on, what we were doing, what he could do for us . he was just a very kind man, a real gentleman," he said.

In 2000, Foster and his wife Lois Foster donated $3.5 million to establish the Lois Foster Wing of the Rose Museum, which doubled the museum's available exhibition space, Reinharz said, in addition to endowing the position of its director.

The Louis Foster Wing is the museum's largest space for contemporary art, Director of Rose Art Museum Michael Rush said. "It has greatly enhanced our ability to present the art of our time."

Rush pointed to the Rose's current exhibition "Invisible Rays: A Surrealism Legacy," which includes multimedia elements that are only presentable in so large a space.

"I know [Henry Foster] was delighted that the museum is able to have large exhibitions that they couldn't do before," John Foster said.

Rush met the couple several times and said "[Foster] and his wife had a very visible loving relationship . It was always wonderful to be around the two of them because their mutual caring for each other was palpable, evident at all times.