CLEMSON, S.C. — Clemson University is marking the death of Wilbur O. Billy Powers, the Florence builder and businessman whose name hangs on its college of business. Powers died at his home in Florence on Monday, Nov. 2. He was 90.
The campus carillon is set to ring in his honor at 11 a.m. Wednesday. Wreaths are going up outside the Powers College of Business building, in its atrium and at the campus memorial to his grandson Chandler Burns, with more placed at the engineering and architecture colleges his giving also reached.
Powers grew up on a farm in Timmonsville and studied civil engineering at Clemson before heading home to help his family. He later started out as an independent land surveyor and built a commercial construction firm that grew into one of the largest in the Southeast, then branched into real estate, aviation and manufacturing with his wife, Ann.
In 2020 the couple gave $60 million to the business school, the biggest academic gift in the university’s history. That money named the college and paid for its two-building complex on campus.
The college has grown since then. Of the 17,000-plus students who applied for the fall 2025 class, the college accepted 1,179 freshmen, about a quarter of all applications to the university. Since 2018, 40,592 students have studied there.
Clemson gave Powers an honorary doctorate in 2004. Family and friends will gather Thursday afternoon at 2 at Florence’s Central Methodist Church to celebrate his life.
Section: More Clemson SC education news
Clemson education business profiles
Filed under: Clemson SC Education News
