Former television host and Notre Dame alumnus Regis Philbin will have a funeral service and be buried on the university campus, which he frequently visited and continued to enthusiastically support long after graduating.
University spokesman Dennis Brown confirmed Sunday that Philbin, who died Friday of natural causes, will have a funeral service at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart and be buried at Cedar Grove Cemetery on campus. The date has not been set.
Philbin graduated from Notre Dame in 1953 and often returned for football games, pep rallies, banquets, concerts and other events.
In October 2002, he invited another famous talk show host, Larry King, to campus after learning that King had never been to Notre Dame Stadium. Philbin said he insisted on giving King a tour of the “greatest college campus in the world.”
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“I said, ‘Oh my goodness, I’d love to show you Notre Dame,'” Philbin said at the time. “I go to a game every now and then. Why don’t you come with me?’ “
His support went beyond football. In 2001, he gave $2.75 million to the university to create the Philbin Studio Theatre, meant for laboratory and performance-arts productions, in the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center.
Philbin for years also hosted or served as guest of honor at fundraisers for the Center for the Homeless in South Bend.
In 1998, he attended a news conference when the then-South Bend-Mishawaka Convention and Visitors’ Bureau unveiled a new brand — “Live the Legends.”
Philbin said at the news conference that his television work often took him to exotic and famous locations “but nothing excites me like coming back to South Bend-Mishawaka.” And he called the new brand “a wonderful idea to remind people what a wonderful place we have.”