In 2003 Alvin Libin and his wife Mona gave $15 million to establish a cardiovascular institute at the University of Calgary, the largest one-time gift in the university’s history at that time. He died on June 14, 2026 at 95, and the institute still carries the family name.
The gift traces back to a heart attack in the early 1980s and a series of fishing trips.
Key facts
- Alvin Libin died on June 14, 2026 at age 95, according to the University of Calgary.
- Alvin and Mona Libin gave $15 million in 2003 to establish the Libin Cardiovascular Institute, then the largest one-time gift in University of Calgary history, and their foundation added $7.5 million in 2022, according to the University of Calgary.
- Libin chaired the Board of Trustees of the Calgary Foothills Hospital from 1980 to 1990, according to the Alvin Libin entry on Wikipedia.
- In 1967 Libin co-founded Villacentres, a 150-bed nursing home that grew into Extendicare, and in 1994 he became one of five co-owners of the Calgary Flames, according to the Alvin Libin entry on Wikipedia.
A heart attack in the early 1980s set the direction
Libin suffered a heart attack in the early 1980s. The cardiologist who treated him, Dr. Eldon Smith, became a close friend, and the two went on annual salmon fishing trips to the West Coast. According to the University of Calgary, they used those trips to talk about creating a cardiovascular research centre.
That conversation ran about two decades before the 2003 gift put money behind it.
He chaired the Foothills board for a decade before the gift
Libin was chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Calgary Foothills Hospital from 1980 to 1990. That service came well before the giving. His business career ran on a separate track, from the 150-bed nursing home he co-founded in 1967 to the Extendicare business that grew from it.
The institute has outlasted the man who paid for it
The University of Calgary reports that the Alvin and Mona Libin Foundation announced a further $7.5 million over the following decade in 2022, bringing its total support to more than $23 million. Work at the institute has included discoveries for cardiac arrest patients, new approaches to managing blood pressure swings after spinal cord injury, and province-wide changes to how major heart attacks are treated. The foundation’s executive director, Eda Libin, represents the third generation of the family involved.
The Libin Cardiovascular Institute still operates at the University of Calgary, and the conversation that started it began on those fishing trips.
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