103-year-old E. Ruth Harris left a $2.4 million gift in her will to Evenglow, a continuing care retirement community in Pontiac, IL, and the real beauty of it is, neither she nor any family member ever lived there.

The “unusually unique experience,” as Evenglow CEO and President Mark Hovren described it to McKnight’s on Tuesday, is a good sign for everyone on his 170-employee campus.

The community, located about 100 miles south of Chicago, first received a call out of the blue from a bank officer in May about the huge donation, which represents about 26% of its regular $9.2 annual budget.

“I was speechless,” said staff member Kathy Alexander, who spoke on the phone with the bank officer.

Harris had previously mentioned to Alexander that her family toured the facility several decades ago. The Chicago Tribune reported that Harris’s parents had been  looking for a home for her sister Agnes Lape, who had a developmental disability, in case the family could at some point no longer provide long-term care. Evenglow pledged to help, but Agnes Lape died in 1995, without ever living there.

“They were so impressed and appreciative of how they were treated,” said Hovren, “and Ruth didn’t forget that.”

A former school teacher and farmer’s wife, Harris had given regular, smaller donations to Evenglow in the past, typically around $100 a year. She had mentioned that the retirement community was in her will but never alluded to the size of the donation. Alexander said in the Tribune account that she vaguely thought it might be a couple thousand dollars, a typical estate gift, which would have been very generous.

“I was just flabbergasted. Because I had seen Ruth in her home,” Alexander said.

On those occasions, Harris usually wore a plain dress and house slippers with no jewelry or fancy possessions or other evidence the elderly woman was a millionaire, Alexander recalled.

Harris died on Jan. 9, 2017, leaving no heirs to her estate.

Hovren said that the CCRC’s governing board hasn’t yet decided precisely how any of the windfall will be spent, but physical plant matters likely will receive a lot of attention.

“The board was clear in stating that we want to enhance the buildings, services and programs. What exactly that will be, we don’t know,” Hovren told McKnight’s.

He said that after the bank called with the initial good news, the board took very deliberate steps to plot a strategy for announcing the gift. At a June board meeting, it was decided that employees would be notified first and then a press release would be sent to local media, which occurred last week.