The Rev. Robert A. Wild, president of Marquette University, heard that the institution would receive a $51-million gift for a new law-school building on his birthday. “That was a day I won’t ever forget,” he said today, in a written statement announcing the donation.

The gift, to be paid over 17 years, is from Raymond A. and Kathryn A. Eckstein, both 1949 graduates of Marquette, where the couple met and “courted,” Mr. Eckstein said. He earned his law degree there, and she received her bachelor’s degree. The love affair with the university has continued through the generations, and their granddaughter recently graduated from the law school as well.

“We saw once again the caring, challenging environment that Marquette continues to offer its students,” Mrs. Eckstein said.

Mr. Eckstein founded two barge- and tugboat-cargo companies that transport goods along the Mississippi River. His second company is named Marquette Transportation, after his alma mater and the French Jesuit priest who explored the Mississippi with Louis Jolliet in the 17th century. —Erin Strout