Building a Legacy
Modesto Bee 1/18/07
Though work on California State University, Stanislaus' new science building -- the Nora and Hashem Naraghi Hall of Science -- isn't complete, the Naraghi family threw a party Wednesday night to celebrate the naming.
One classroom was open to the high-heeled and cuff-linked guests. The completed $57 million building will boast four classrooms, 25 laboratories and 16prep rooms along with an outdoor organic farming area and greenhouse. It should open with the fall semester.
Hashem Naraghi, a farmer, inventor, developer and businessman who died in January 2006, donated $2 million to the university.
Naraghi pioneered farming almonds in the uncultivated and arid foothills of eastern Stanislaus County after migrating to Modesto from Iran via New York.
"It's significant that Hashem planted in less fertile areas," Attorney General and former Gov. Jerry Brown told the more than 380 guests in the university's main dinning hall after a reception at the construction site. "That takes great imagination and great risk. That tells you a lot about the man."
By the 1970s, Naraghi was one of the world's largest almond growers. His farming operation spanned more than 20,000 acres in Stanislaus, Merced, Madera and San Joaquin counties.
H. Naraghi Farms still operates from San Joaquin County to Monterey County and northern Los Angeles County, growing almonds, walnuts, wine grapes and pistachios.
Naraghi's wife, Nora, was successful as a journalist and published poet in Armenia under the pen name Elba before starting their family. She died in 2003.
Hashem Naraghi "wanted my mother's name first," said their son, Wendell Naraghi. "He always got top billing, H. Naraghi Farms and the like. But with this, he said, 'Nora is what the family is all about.'"
The $70,000 event was paid forby the family and timed to coincide with the one-year anniversary of Hashem's death. It's apropos that of all the couple's accomplishments, their legacy will beeducation, said Hashem and Nora's daughter, Sharon Naraghi, a 1979 Stanislaus State graduate.
"Nothing would have made my father happier than to see this," Sharon said as throngs of guests took their seats. "We're so thankful our closest friends and family were able to be here."
When the last of the speakers left the podium, guests dined on a Persian buffet -- salad shirzi, yogurt and cucumbers, gabher polo and kabobs.
"It's thrilling and exciting to know this legacy will go on and on," said Dianne Gagos, president of the CSU Stanislaus Foundation, "providing for the children of our area, of our state."