University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire has announced a gift valued at $10 million from alumni John ('66) and Carolyn ('67) Sonnentag in support of a new events facility.

Awarded through the Sonnentag Foundation, the largest gift to the UW-Eau Claire Foundation in its nearly sixty-year history will transfer twenty-one acres of land currently owned by County Materials Corp., the Sonnentags' family-owned concrete manufacturing company, to Blugold Real Estate, a subsidiary of the UW-Eau Claire Foundation. The land will serve as the site of a multipurpose events center that will accommodate at least seventy-five hundred people. The  foundation also pledged a significant monetary contribution in support of the center, for which additional funds will need to be raised.

"Carolyn and I feel that the UW-Eau Claire and the Eau Claire communities have made such a great contribution to our lives that we want to give back in whatever capacity we can," said John Sonnentag. "We are very pleased to help make this project happen."