2024-ENG-I3-Magazine_ISSUU

IMAGINE•INNOVATE•INSPIRE 05

a house that could accommodate 200 guests. John and Raffaella started hosting larger gatherings and began their sponsorship of the opera and symphony. The Belanichs sought to provide backing for engineering and considered the local universities. With Rafaella’s degree from USD and her connections dating back to the university’s founder, the couple landed on the University of San Diego for their philanthropic efforts in engineering. Pictured at left at the ground breaking celebration of the Belanich Engineering Center in 2018 with Dean Chell Roberts and wife Raffaella, Belanich held up a slide rule to show how far engineering has come. He told the audience that he and Raffaella were proud to be part of the school that will help discover and invent new products and services for a better world. “The best is yet to come!” he exclaimed. The legacy of John Belanich will endure through “the generations that pass through the Belanich Engineering Center,” David expresses. “We are humbled by that.”

engineering degree, then worked for Sperry Gyroscopes. He moved to San Diego in 1958, seeking opportunities in aeronautical engineering and landed at the Convair division of General Dynamics, working on Atlas rockets for NASA’s Mercury Project. “I always thought of my dad as an electro-mechanical engineer,” says son David Belanich. “He finished his career at Teledyne Ryan, working on the radar guidance system for the Apollo lunar landing module. I was an astro-nut because of him.” Belanich’s true passion was sailing, but he found little time to get out on the water with a 9-to-5 job. His yacht club peers encouraged him to dabble in real estate, which became a new passion that fueled his love for sailing. “Once the income from real estate outperformed his engineering career, he focused on real estate and sailing,” David explains. Utilizing his engineering acumen, Belanich designed and built a first of-its-kind multi-boat trailer so that one car could transport 12 Sabots from Mission Bay Yacht Club to other local yacht clubs. “My dad came up with a trailer that made it easier for families to get their kids to San Diego, Coronado and Oceanside yacht clubs. That design was copied by the other area yacht clubs and is still in use today.” After John and Raffaella married in 1986, they bought a home in La Jolla. The couple, pictured at right, hosted lively gatherings of family and friends abound with music in their home, with Belanich playing his beloved accordion. Raffaella’s passion for the symphony and opera inspired the couple’s frequent attendance at these cultural events. As their social circle within these organizations expanded and it came time to remodel the home, Belanich envisioned

This transformative gift gave us space where our students can practice being the Changemakers that will change the world.

—Dean Chell Roberts