Galen moved to Los Angeles at age 6 with his mother, Faye Roberts, from Youngstown, Ohio, after his father committed suicide.
After the war, Galen used $5,000 in military pay to help found Lynwood Savings and Loan in 1946 with his mother, Faye Roberts, and various family members (his $5,000 investment bought him 10% of the S & L's stock).
He never played sports for USC, but had been a fan since boyhood, when he worked at the Coliseum as a hot dog vendor at Trojan football games.
[3] In 1997, Galen suffered complications after heart surgery to replace a valve and was in a coma for 42 days; after he recovered he decided that he wanted to give away most of his money.
Later that year, Galen and his wife donated $1.25 million to USC to establish a student-athlete dining and social activity hall.
In 2000 he donated an additional $300,000 for a ceramics studio in the USC School of Fine Arts; he also endowed the Helene V. Galen Intermedia Lab.
After USC football quarterback Carson Palmer won the 2002 Heisman Trophy, Galen donated $10 million to move the development process forward.