UF business college namesake Alfred Warrington dies

In the 35 years Gary McGill knew Alfred “Al” Warrington, he never saw the accounting CEO wear a suit, he said. Instead, the UF alumnus and namesake of the university’s business college always wore an orange and blue tracksuit, he said.

“When they say somebody bleeds orange and blue, they’re talking about Al Warrington,” said McGill, the director of the UF Fisher School of Accounting.

Warrington died May 20 of natural causes. He was 85 years old.

UF renamed the business school to the “Warrington College of Business” in his honor after he donated $12 million to the faculty of the business school in 1996. As a UF student, he was an active member of Chi Phi, Beta Alpha Psi and Delta Sigma Pi, according to the Warrington Newsroom.

Warrington was a first generation college student who paved his way to graduation, McGill said. He worked odd jobs like cleaning fraternity houses to afford tuition.

“He went from nothing to the kind of person who could give away $100 million,” McGill said.

In 2014, Warrington and his wife Judy Warrington gave the university $75 million, the largest donation in its history. With this, they became the first people to donate a total of $100 million to UF.

One focus of his donations was toward the faculty and cultivating their abilities in order for the school to reach its full potential, John Kraft, current dean of the Warrington College of Business, said. He wanted the UF business school to be competitive with the other top ten business schools, Kraft said.

“He accumulated wealth with the idea of helping other people, not just for himself” Kraft said.”

Warrington started delivering newspapers when he was 8, according to the Warrington Newsroom. He joined the national accounting firm Arthur Anderson & Co. after graduating from UF in 1958 with a bachelor’s of science in business administration with a major in accounting, and he eventually rose to become a managing partner of the firm.

In addition, Warrington co-founded Sanifill, Inc. which merged with Waste Management Inc. in 1996, the largest environmental services company in the U.S. He jokingly referred to himself as “a garbage man,” Kraft said.

He served on the UF Board of Trustees from 2001 to 2013, was president of the UF Alumni Association and was a board member of the student athlete scholarship organization Gator Boosters, Inc., according to the Warrington Newsroom. In 2003, he was inducted into the UF Athletic Hall of Fame for his work with Gator Boosters, Inc., according to the Commemorative Gallery of Accounting History.

Warrington could see the positive side of any circumstance and knew that he had the power to make it better, Kraft said, and he hopes Warrington’s life will teach people to see the world that way, too.

“He was just a really generous individual with a real vision to try and continually improve both the university and improve the lives of the people who are involved in university,” Kraft said.

Warrington is survived by his wife, Judy, his sons Al Warrington V and Tom, his daughter-in-law Stephanie and his three grandchildren.

Contact Ariana at aaspuru@alligator.org. Follow her on Twitter at @arianaluzzz.

Alfred Warrington was a first generation college student who paved his way to becoming a major UF donor.