The 88-year-old Hippodrome Theater, one of Baltimore's most distinctively named landmarks, will be renamed for the France-Merrick Foundation when it reopens in 2004 after a $60 million overhaul paid for in large part by taxpayers.

A new name has not been chosen. The plan is for the marquee to proclaim it the France-Merrick Performing Arts Center, although "Hippodrome" likely will be incorporated into the new name in some fashion.

The Towson foundation won naming rights last year by pledging $5 million - 8.3 percent of the total renovation cost - and doing so at a time when some skeptics wondered whether the project would succeed, said its chief fund-raiser.

"France-Merrick, probably more than any institution in Baltimore, has led the effort over the past year to get this theater built," said Mark Sissman, chief executive of the Baltimore Center for the Performing Arts.

The nonprofit group is teaming with the Maryland Stadium Authority to turn the long-dormant theater on Eutaw Street into the city's showcase for Broadway shows. City planners and developers view it as a big piece of the west side's revival.

Foundation vice president Walter D. Pinkard Jr. said his charity rarely puts its name on buildings. But he called this a rare opportunity because the funding helps in three significant ways: "preserving a building, furthering culture and being a catalyst to community development."

Pinkard suggested one possibility: the Hippodrome Theater at the France-Merrick Performing Arts Center.

The foundation is not the largest contributor to the project. The state has given $16.5 million in cash, and Baltimore is adding $6 million. This month the state Board of Public Works is expected to vote whether to approve the sale of about $17 million in stadium-authority bonds for the project.

But Sissman said the public sources "represent a different standard." Many buildings that use public subsidies are named for private donors, he said. "We don't name each one the Maryland Performing Arts Center or Maryland Stadium or Maryland Symphony Hall," he said.

"The tradition here," he said, "has been to name important institutions around places and people and contributors."

In January 1999, the now-bankrupt PSINet Corp. struck a 20-year, $105.5 million deal to emblazon its name on the state-funded football stadium used by the Ravens.

The Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, which opened in 1982, might provide a parallel example. But Meyerhoff's contribution of $10.6 million was nearly half the $23.8 million cost. The state and city covered the rest.

At first, France-Merrick said its grant would require a dollar-for-dollar match from other private sources. However, the stadium authority said the foundation had to guarantee the $5 million to have naming rights, Sissman said.

David Cope, a Bethesda expert in naming rights, said he did not know enough about this instance to say whether the foundation's gift warrants naming rights. Still, he said, "If the Hippodrome was looking for $5 million, and these guys were willing to give, what you have is win-win."

One person displeased by the name change is Robert Rappaport. His father, Isadore Rappaport, owned the Hippodrome at the height of the vaudeville era. "It's a historic landmark," he said, "synonymous with entertainment in Baltimore."

Rappaport said the city institution should not sell its name to a private contributor, noting, "They'll do anything for a buck."

Robert K. Headley, author of Exit, a book about historic Baltimore movie theaters, said that whatever the name, "there has to be some mention that it is the Hippodrome. ... That's what people remember."

One unknown is whether the public will embrace a new name. "You can't make people call it what you want," said Cope, director of business development and sales at Gilco Sports and Entertainment Marketing. Eventually, he said, Hippodrome partisans will "phase themselves out."

Sun staff writer Jon Morgan and researcher Sheila Jackson contributed to this article.