Amanda Reed

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Amanda Reed (1832–1904) was the wife and widow of Simeon Gannett Reed, American entrepreneur from Oregon.

In Simeon's will, he suggested that his wife could "devote some portion of (his) estate to benevolent objects, or to the cultivation, illustration, or development of the fine arts in the city of Portland, Oregon, or to some other suitable purpose, which shall be of permanent value and contribute to the beauty of the city and to the intelligence, prosperity, and happiness of the inhabitants."^{[citation needed]}

Amanda Reed followed that suggestion in her will by setting up a board of trustees to found an institution of learning in Portland, Oregon, with no limits other than an insistence on equality and secularism.^{[citation needed]} In 1908, Reed College was established; William M. Ladd (son of former Portland mayor William S. Ladd) provided the lands on which the college stands today,^[1] and almost all of Reed's estate was passed on to the college, Reed having left no heirs. Amanda Reed and her husband Simeon are buried near the family plot of Jacob Kamm in Portland's River View Cemetery. In the ensuing years, Reed College has become one of the nation's pre-eminent institutions of the liberal arts and sciences.