This piece in the WSJ on billionaire T. Boone Pickens and the structure of his gifts to Oklahoma State athletic department is worth a look. Most notably, check out one particular investment strategy involving OSU alums that Pickens dubbed ‘Gift of A Lifetime’: Separately, Mr. Pickens concocted an unusual plan to supercharge returns for Cowboy Athletics. He sold school officials on a program to generate up to $250 million for the endowment by taking out multimillion-dollar insurance policies on the lives of older Oklahoma State alumni. The expectation was that the death payouts would exceed the premiums. I know that it’s not uncommon to invest in insurance policies but this is creepy. Basically OSU loses if these folks don’t die when they are supposed to…like good & loyal Cowboys would of course. Funny, the photo in the article shows a OSU fan holding a giant Pickens head at a game (left). Thankfully this didn’t escalate to fans raising actual heads of dead alums whose lives proved profitable for the athletic department. Shocker: the program turned out to be a bust. More: Oklahoma State President V. Burns Hargis stepped in to help Mr. Holder, the athletic director, figure out what to do about the $16.6 million in insurance premiums due in February 2009. He called on a retired insurance executive and…