Dayton-area entrepreneur, philanthropist Roger Glass, 80, has died

DAYTON — Dayton-area entrepreneur and philanthropist Roger Glass, the president and CEO of Marion’s Piazza, died Wednesday at hospice. He was 80 years old.

News Center 7 anchor James Brown was able to confirm word of Glass’s death through one of the restaurants and two other sources who were close to Glass,

>> RELATED: UD performing arts center to open for 2023-24 academic year

Last November, the University of Dayton announced it would build the “Roger Glass Center for the Arts” at the southeast corner of Main and Stewart streets.

He was the lead donor for the center, UD’s first building dedicated to concerts, dance and theater performances, and art exhibits, according to the University of Dayton magazine.

The $45 million, 51,000-square-foot center will include flexible space for theater, dance and performance technology students to experiment and innovate; a 400-seat concert hall that can be acoustically tuned to groups ranging from the orchestra to smaller ensembles; and a visible and accessible art gallery, according to the university.

The center also will provide custom-built experiential learning space for student-managed media — Flyer News, Flyer TV and Flyer Radio — to prepare for careers in media. Student demand for the academic and experiential learning programs to be featured in the Roger Glass Center has been growing stronger for many years.

The project has support from 120 donors, including Martha M. Walter, whose 2002 bequest for a future arts center was critical to making the facility possible. Donors also include faculty and staff who wished to support the vision for the arts center.

“The Roger Glass Center for the Arts will be the front porch of the University, an entry point for the community to campus and an architectural bridge between historic campus and the new development that will happen at on Main, Dayton’s imagination district,” Jason Pierce, former college of arts and sciences dean, told the university’s magazine for an article published in March.

The facility is tentatively scheduled to be open for the 2023-24 academic year.

Chaminade Julienne High School’s athletic facility, which opened in August 2016, is named Roger Glass Stadium.

>> WATCH: An aerial tour of Roger Glass Stadium at Chaminade Julienne

The $6 million facility features a practice field, stadium seating that holds more than 2,100 people, and a 99,600-square-foot stadium field at the corners of Longworth and Eaker streets designed to host high school football, soccer and lacrosse competitions, as well as professional soccer matches.

Roger Glass was the second-generation owner of the pizza business his father, Marion Glass, founded in 1965.

In January 2019, Glass was named “Daytonian of the Week” by Dayton.com.

In October 2018, “Pizza Today” named Marion’s No. 1 on its “hot 100″ list for the third consecutive year based on the chain’s sales success, dayton.com reported in January 2019.

Marion’s Piazza also swept three categories in the Dayton.com Best of 2018 contest, placing first for “Best Pizza Restaurant,” “Best Square-Cut Pizza” and “Best Restaurant to Take an Out-of-Towner.”

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