Worth a billion

Shortly after his graduation from UD, finance major Pat Brice ’00 landed a job interview in his hometown of Chicago. But as the interview started, he was a little thrown off when the interviewer asked him, “How many pennies could fit in this room?”

Brice quickly answered, “I don’t know ... a billion?”

This small interaction from a job he didn’t even get became a life-changing moment, and one that soon got a lot of laughs. Brice became a trader by day for the CME Group with the Chicago Board of Trade, but by night, Brice became a staple in Chicago’s stand-up comedy scene. One of his funniest bits? His retelling of the billion pennies story.

“[The interviewer] doesn’t want the correct answer. He wants to see a comfortable, calm guy do reasonable math,” Brice said in a YouTube video of this joke. “Apparently, what he doesn’t want to hear is this: ‘I’m going to say a billion!’”

Brice died in 2007, at age 29. But his closest family, friends and fellow Flyers couldn’t let their lives go on without honoring him.

“Pat was just one of those guys,” said Chuck Pointer ’98. “He was very intelligent, but if we were sitting around laughing, he could transcend the group. He was just a really smart, sharp, witty guy who was also very caring.”

Pointer, along with Greg Kevane ’00 and Flyers Keith Ellett ’01, Greg Gerba ’00, Tom Hack ’01, Robert “Chip” Hurt ’98 and Bridget Kelly ’00, plus Brice’s brother, Dan Brice, created the A Billion Pennies Foundation.

Earlier this year, the foundation made a $100,000 gift to the University to establish the A Billion Pennies Scholarship, supporting students to attend UD.

"We’re doing this for Pat, but we’re also going to be able to send somebody to Dayton, helping make that tuition just a little bit more affordable."

“We’re doing this for Pat, but we’re also going to be able to send somebody to Dayton, helping make that tuition just a little bit more affordable,” said Kevane. “We want to give somebody an opportunity to attend what we all consider an awesome university.”

In October, the organization will host a live stand-up comedy event in Chicago supporting the launch of the scholarship endowment, featuring Flyer and comedian Pat McGann ’98.

Organizers hope to fill the room with a billion people, or a billion pennies. Whichever fits. 

A version of this article appears in print in the Autumn 2025 University of Dayton Magazine, Page 53.  EXPLORE THE ISSUE — MORE ONLINE