NEW LONDON, Conn. -- When it all started in 1997, Claire Gaudiani was the president of Connecticut College, a specialist in French literature and philanthropy who had become a flamboyant and fabulously successful fund-raiser at the pricey school on a hill overlooking this economically depressed old whaling port. She saw it as her social obligation to spearhead an ambitious redevelopment plan - a Pfizer pharmaceutical headquarters anchoring a waterfront hotel, upscale new housing, and retail and office space - that would revitalize the city's tax base and give hope to those less fortunate. "It was a very idealistic vision," said...