To open its new underground library, Yale University threw a midnight bash inspired by the “Harry Potter” book release parties at the same hour.

More than 1,000 students, professors, administrators, and employees showed up for the Friday party, the highlight of which was remarks from the man who is perhaps Yale’s most hip, nocturnal donor: William Wright II of New York, a Morgan Stanley managing director and 1982 graduate of Yale College.

With his $1 million gift to the library, Mr. Wright is also the first African-American Yale alumnus to become a major donor and one of the few from the classes of the 1980s forward to make a donation of that size.

A dedication ceremony next month will honor all the donors to the project, chief among them alumnus Robert Bass and his wife, Anne, who gave $13 million and after whom the new library has been named the Bass Library.

But on Friday, the spotlight belonged to Mr. Wright.

“Everyone thinks libraries don’t matter anymore, with the Internet and so on, but let me wish you all one thing: that in the Bass Library you will find wisdom and judgment to solve the great problems of the world,” he said to whoops and applause.

He then joined a mob of students who thanked and hugged him as they headed to the library’s entrance.

“You’re the man,” Sebastian Perez, a sophomore, said.

A graduate student in mechanical engineering, Cheng Xi, asked Mr. Wright to pose for a photograph with her and told him, “Lots of people have lots of money, but this is the best way I can think of using it.”

Later, Mr. Wright led a procession to place the first books on the shelves; his book was “A Yale Album,” a book of photographs of the university. And only then did he get to see the reaction of students to the room his gift created, the Wright Reading Room, housed underneath the Gothic, cathedral-style Sterling Memorial Library.

Like the rest of the new library, the Wright Reading Room is lavishly appointed. Formerly a 1970s all-white den of fluorescent lights whose most famous spaces were “weenie bins,” or individual study carrels, and Machine City, a gathering spot with vending machines, the Bass Library has been transformed with red brick walls, oak wood carrels, marble tables, and leather armchairs. When the Library Café opens tomorrow, students can purchase food from Yale’s Sustainable Food Project, including hot chocolate made from scratch and locally made kettle corn.

“Bill Wright is one of Yale’s most devoted supporters. He has a deep appreciation of the transforming power of education, and his support for Yale’s libraries comes straight from the heart,” the president of Yale University, Richard Levin, said.

The development officer who worked with Mr. Wright on his gift, James Nondorf, noted Mr. Wright’s youth: “The bulk of huge gifts come from alums of the ’50s and ’60s, and for somebody in the ’80s early on to step up and make these kinds of commitments, both of time and funds, is really remarkable,” Mr. Nondorf, now the vice president for enrollment at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, said.

Mr. Wright is proud to be the first African-American graduate to become a major donor; it’s a role that seems fitting, as he was the first black student to become publisher of the Yale Daily News. He was also business manager of the Ulysses S. Grant Foundation, which directs resources to underprivileged children in New Haven’s public schools.

“Being an African-American at Yale was wonderful. Yale is a very welcoming and egalitarian and fair place,” he said. “I would go back in a heartbeat.”

Life has been good to Mr. Wright since Yale. “Morgan Stanley is place that from the very earliest part of my career has given me immense responsibility and challenge,” he said.

Hanging out at 1 a.m. in the Wright Reading Room in his cashmere tweed jacket and jeans, he could easily have passed as a graduate student or junior professor. In fact, Mr. Wright, 47, is global head of mobility at Morgan Stanley, leading talent development to manage the firm’s international expansion. On the basis of tenure, he is the most senior African-American at the firm, which he joined after graduating from Yale. His only absence from the firm was the two years he spent obtaining an M.B.A. from the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business.

So far, the “crowning glory” of his career at Morgan Stanley was taking UPS public as the head of the Corporate Finance Execution Group with 55 people working under him.

Meanwhile, he is making his mark in philanthropic circles.

“He is perhaps our youngest, most active, and enthusiastic board member,” the president of New York City Ballet, Frederick Beinecke, who is also a Yale graduate and whose family members donated the money to build the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, said. “He’s particularly good at fostering interest among young professionals.”

Mr. Wright was born in Hempstead, Texas. He grew up in Norfolk, Va., the eldest of two children of Lillian and William Wright, who were education professors at Norfolk State University. His sister followed him at Yale and is now a state appellate court judge in Minnesota.

Norfolk was a segregated city during Mr. Wright’s childhood. His parents fought to send him to a school with a gifted and talented program that was far away from home. After school, he’d go to the public library until his parents could pick him up. When he was older, he spent most of his time at the library at the university where his parents taught.

He credits his parents with establishing in him the desire to give back.

“They were very civic-minded people, always very involved in the community and always giving back,” Mr. Wright said. His mother, who is 77, is still a member of the school board.

Philanthropy is essential to Mr. Wright, he said. “I am not a golfer, I am not a tennis player. I don’t own a sailboat. The boards and not-for-profits that I am involved in are, in a sense, my avocation and hobby. Giving back in that way is very important to me. It gives me sustenance,” he said.

Mr. Wright’s first fund-raising effort came when he was a teenager. He sold doughnuts to raise money for a local hospital. Today he is a member of the board of Continuum Health Partners, which owns four local hospitals: St. Luke’s-Roosevelt, Beth Israel, Long Island College, and New York Eye and Ear.

Living in New York has shaped his outlook. “To be a part of the community that is New York is to be motivated to give back,” Mr. Wright said. He was honored to participate in the funeral of Brooke Astor as the senior warden of the vestry of St. Thomas Church, on Fifth Avenue.

The culture at Morgan Stanley has also encouraged him to give back, he said. “Going back to the House of Morgan, the firm has always been a place that is about its community and encouraging people to be involved and to give back to the communities,” Mr. Wright said. He and some colleagues started the First Connect Initiative at Morgan Stanley, which encourages junior professionals at the firm to get involved on boards and in organizations in the city. Mr. Wright is also a trustee of the company’s foundation.

Education is an important area of philanthropy for Mr. Wright; he wrote his senior thesis as a history major at Yale about the philanthropist Anson Phelps Stokes, who focused his giving on educating African-Americans. In this arena, Mr. Wright serves as a trustee of Donors Choose, a Web site that enables donors to give to charter schools. “My parents both grew up with very poor backgrounds,” he said. “Their ability to go to college and ultimately to get their Ph.D.s was a great liberator. Education is a liberator.”

Those who know Mr. Wright describe his engaging smile, infectious laugh, loyalty to his alma mater, firm, and friends, and outstanding letter-writing ability.

“After you meet with him at lunch as you’re walking back to your office, you think, ‘I was so lucky to go to Yale,'” a classmate, Frederick Leone, said.

As the gift to the library suggests, Mr. Wright is an avid reader. He’s currently reading “Mobilizing Minds: Creating Wealth from Talent in the 21st Century Organization” and “Conquering Gotham: A Gilded Age Epic: The Construction of Penn Station and Its Tunnels.” He maintains libraries at his homes on Park Avenue and in Water Mill, N.Y.

And yes, “People do borrow,” he said.