In Memoriam: Phyllis D. Mailman, Transformative Benefactor
The Columbia Mailman School community mourns the passing of Phyllis D. Mailman, holding up her legacy of kindness, leadership, and unwavering commitment to public health, medicine, higher education, and the arts.
In 1998, Mrs. Mailman and her family made a transformative gift to the School, then known as the Columbia University School of Public Health. At the time, the family’s gift was the largest single gift ever made to a public health school in the United States. In recognition of the Mailman family’s historic contribution, the School was renamed the Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health, in honor of Mrs. Mailman’s late husband. Mrs. Mailman’s two children, Ms. Jody Wolfe and Mr. Joshua Mailman, have also been long-standing members of the School’s Board of Advisors and supporters of the School’s programs.
Mrs. Mailman played an unparalleled role in helping shape the Columbia Mailman School’s mission and impact by providing scholarship funding, supporting schoolwide programs, and serving on the School’s Board of Advisors for almost three decades. A natural philanthropist skilled with keen leadership and an innovative spirit, in 2011 she created and led tirelessly the School’s biennial gala. Through the years, she grew the School’s gala by serving on its committees and building strong networks of friends for the School.
Her leadership and generosity helped propel world-class educational programs, faculty advancement, groundbreaking research, and innovative public health solutions. In 2019, her family co-established the Phyllis Mailman Professorship of Public Health, to be held by a distinguished researcher in the Center for Infection and Immunity. By endowing this professorship in perpetuity, they positioned the School to attract and retain talented and accomplished faculty members who will help build on the School’s history of excellence and leadership in emerging infectious disease research.
“Phyllis Mailman and her family transformed our school through their extraordinary support, creating a legacy of premier public health education and renowned research. Because of Phyllis, the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health will continue to define public health excellence well into the next century,” says Interim Dean Kathleen J. Sikkema.
“Phyllis Mailman cared deeply about improving lives and recognized the foundational values of science and education for preventing disease, disability, and injury, and promoting health as essential to those principles. Her generous investment, in honor of her late husband Joseph Mailman, propelled the School’s ability to meet these goals for the public good,” says Linda P. Fried, Dean Emerita and director of the Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center.
Mrs. Mailman’s impact, generosity, and leadership are also felt at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center, where she served as a member of the Columbia University Irving Medical Center Board of Advisors, the Health Sciences Advisory Council, and the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons Advisory Council. In addition to her dedicated service, she supported the work of young investigators, postdoctoral fellows, assistant professors at the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, student scholarships, and research at the Celiac Disease Center.
Outside of the Columbia University Irving Medical Center, Mrs. Mailman served as an Executive Member and School and Programs Chair of the Columbia University Campaign Volunteer Leadership, and as a member of the Dean’s Council of the Columbia University School of the Arts. Her act of generosity touched the lives of countless members of the Columbia community with her support of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the School of Law, and the Columbia Climate School.
Mrs. Mailman was raised in Brookline, Massachusetts, and attended Radcliffe College. She and her late husband, Joseph L. Mailman, were principal supporters of the Mailman Research Center at McLean Hospital of Harvard Medical School in Massachusetts and the Mailman Center for Child Development at the University of Miami. She held leadership roles in the Mailman Foundation and the Joshua Mailman Foundation, her family’s foundations, and was active in the arts and business communities, including serving on the Board of Directors of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.
