Howie McCormick/ For The Herald-Dispatch This photo of Joan C. Edwards and her dog, Mocha, was taken days before the pre-opening ceremony of the Joan C. Edwards Cancer Center in September 2005.

Philanthropist Joan C. Edwards, whose generosity to the city of Huntington, Marshall University and state of West Virginia will leave a lasting impression for decades, died about 2 a.m. Sunday at Cabell Huntington Hospital after a two-year battle with inoperable liver cancer. She was 87.

Her generosity, combined with that of her late husband, James Edwards, has benefited too many local organizations to count -- and the good from those contributions runs too deep to measure, many say.
Together, the couple donated more than $65 million to Marshall and the Huntington community. Her name graces many a building -- including the Joan C. Edwards Performing Arts Center, the Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine and Joan C. Edwards Stadium, which is the only Division I college football stadium named after a woman.

But it's not a dollar amount or the name on a building for which she will be most remembered, said Brent Marsteller, CEO and president of Cabell Huntington Hospital. It was her ability to demonstrate a genuine thrill for life and share her many blessings to enrich the lives of others.
"Looking past the monetary gifts, she was a wonderful individual and a very bright woman who was so engaging," Marsteller said. "Deep down, she was a great person, and we're all going to miss her because of that."

At Marshall, the Edwards donated more than $22 million to performing arts and jazz education, as well as Marshall's football program and the medical school. She also was instrumental in opening a a conservatory at the Huntington Museum of Art and a new wing through the West Virginia Diocese of the Episcopal Church at the Woodlands Retirement Community.
But her dream, said her stepdaughter Jean Ripley, was to see the completion of the Edwards Comprehensive Cancer Center at Cabell Huntington Hospital.

Edwards had watched her husband, stepson Charles and sister die from cancer. And when she was diagnosed with liver cancer in 2004, it made her work even harder to make sure the cancer center would be finished, said Huntington resident Jack Jenkins, Edwards' attorney and close friend for more than 30 years.

"She refused to slow down," Jenkins said. "Her driving force was Jimmie's wishes. Any time she was faced with an obstacle, she would stop and say, 'What would Jimmie have done?' Then she would march on."
The center, which was built with about $47 million from the Edwards estate, opened in January. Edwards was able to attend a pre-opening ceremony last fall.

If the cancer center helps Huntington-area families win their battles with cancer, "I'll be grinning up in heaven, if that's where I get," she told The Herald-Dispatch last fall during an interview at her Huntington condominium. Many local children and families that had to drive hundreds of miles to get the most advanced cancer care now can stay close to home, she said.
It was Edwards' wish to be brought back to Huntington to die, Ripley said.
"She loved this community. This is where she wanted to be," Ripley said.
Edwards was flown from her home in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., to Cabell Huntington Hospital about two weeks ago, Ripley said.
Jenkins said he had the opportunity to visit Edwards in her hospital room a few days before she died.

"She was excited, because she was going to take her grandchildren on a tour of the cancer center that afternoon," he said. "She lived life to the fullest, even up to the very end."

The daughter of the late William Cavill and Louise Mae Harriss Cavill, Edwards is survived by her stepdaughters, Ripley and Susan E. Drake, and their children and grandchildren; a nephew, Jack Hanemann, and his wife, Patti, of St. Francisville, La.