The family of John Dyson, a former chairman of the New York Power Authority, on Tuesday pledged to give $25 million to Cornell University to establish a school of applied economics and management.

The school will be named after Dyson's late father, Charles, a pioneer in the high-finance field of leveraged buyouts who helped organize the International Monetary Fund while working at the U.S. Treasury Department.

"Although he would be a bit embarrassed by this attention, Charles Dyson would be delighted with the education it will provide and the leaders it will nourish," said Dyson, whose Millbrook Capital Management investment firm operates a manufacturing company, a wine business and a hedge fund.

Some 800 graduate and undergraduate students are enrolled at Cornell's Department of Applied Economics and Management, which opened in 1909. The gift from brothers John, Robert and Peter Dyson - all Cornell graduates - will elevate the department to the status of a school.

The "I Love New York" campaign was developed while John Dyson was state commerce commissioner in the 1970s, before he was put in charge of the power authority by Gov. Hugh Carey. He later served as a deputy mayor under New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

In 1986, after resigning from the power authority, Dyson was the party favorite for the Democratic nomination to challenge Republican Sen. Alfonse D'Amato. He lost in a primary and D'Amato was re-elected.

Dyson opened Millbrook Vineyards in the mid-1980s, a highly regarded winery seen as crucial to the Hudson Valley's ascent as a wine region.

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University video of Tuesday's announcement of the gift: