The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation
Michael W. Grebe has been named the next president of the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. A current board member at Bradley, Grebe is currently CEO of Foley & Lardner, a large national law firm also based in Milwaukee. He will assume the presidency upon his retirement from the firm in July. During the transition, the foundation’s executive vice president, Daniel Schmidt, will remain as acting CEO.
Grebe has been president of the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents, chairman of the United States Military Academy’s board of visitors, and chairman and president of the Curative Rehabilitation Center. He serves on the boards of the University School of Milwaukee, Stanford’s Hoover Institution, the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, the Oshkosh Truck Company, and the Milwaukee Brewers Baseball Club. A five-time Republican National Convention delegate from Wisconsin, he was chairman of the rules committee at the 2000 convention. After graduation from West Point, Grebe served in Vietnam and then earned his law degree from the University of Michigan.
He told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, “I do not foresee significant change in the foundation’s approach and philosophy,” though funding of defense and national security issues may increase somewhat.
The Bradley Foundation’s board has also elected three new members. Bill Armstrong represented Colorado in the U.S. Senate for two terms, having previously served in the House and the Colorado state legislature; he is currently chairman of four mortgage banking firms and a director of several corporations. Pierre S. du Pont IV is a director of the Richards, Layton & Finger law firm of Delaware and a weekly columnist for opinionjournal.com; a former two-term governor of Delaware, he also served in the U.S. House. Thomas L. Smallwood is an attorney with the Borgelt, Powell, Peterson & Frauen law firm in Milwaukee and a trustee and administrator of the Evan and Marion Helfaer Foundation. He is the chairman of the Wisconsin Steel and Tube Corporation.
Established in 1985, the Bradley Foundation had assets of $626 million at the close of 2000. Its founders “believed that, over time, the consequences of ideas were more decisive than the force of political or economic movements,” and that “only in an environment of political and economic freedom could individuals develop their talents, hone their skills and intellects, and contribute to the improvement of the human condition.”
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Donors Trust
James Piereson, executive director of the John M. Olin Foundation and a board member of The Philanthrophy Roundtable, has joined the board of directors of Donors Trust. Founded in 1999 and based in Alexandria, Virginia, Donors Trust is a donor-advised fund with assets of over $18 million that is “committed to honoring donor intent in support of liberty.”
Before joining the Olin Foundation in 1981, Mr. Piereson served on the faculties of the University of Pennsylvania, Indiana University, and Iowa State University. He now serves on the boards of the Hoover Institution and the William E. Simon Foundation. Donors Trust executive director Whitney Ball praised Piereson’s “long track record of supporting liberty-minded programs and honoring donor intent.”
Mr. Piereson discusses his current project of spending down the Olin Foundation per its donor’s intent on page 23 of this issue.
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Achelis and Bodman Foundations
Horace I. Crary Jr. and Sarah Henry Lederman have joined the board of the Achelis and Bodman Foundations. The two New York City foundations have the same trustees, staff, and grant guidelines, and together possess over $100 million in assets.
Crary is senior vice president and head of the New York Private Client Group at Brown Brothers Harriman & Company. Previously he worked for J. P. Morgan for over 20 years. A member of the Benevolence Committee of the Brick Church in New York, which makes grants to local organizations, Crary was educated at Amherst and the Hotchkiss School.
Lederman is an instructor at New York University, where she has taught such courses as “The Foundations of Education” and “The History of the Helping Professions: Nursing, Teaching, and Social Work.” She is currently completing a book, Progressive Against the State: Mary E. Richmond and the Creation of Social Case Work. A board member of St. Matthew’s and St. Timothy’s Neighborhood Center (a settlement house), Lederman graduated from Princeton and earned a doctorate in American history from Columbia.
The Achelis and Bodman Foundations were established in 1940 and 1945, respectively. They fund mainly in New York and support such projects as a microenterprise program for entrepreneurs in Harlem, Habitat for Humanity, the National Fatherhood Initiative, and efforts by the Center for Educational Reform to inform New Yorkers and New Jerseyites about charter schools and school choice.
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Joyce Foundation
Ellen Alberding has been elected president of the Joyce Foundation. She had previously managed the foundation’s investments and directed its grant making in the culture program. Under her stewardship, the foundation’s investment portfolio grew from $280 million to $850 million. Alberding also earlier served as a program officer in the education program. Her other activities include serving as treasurer of the national philanthropic group Grantmakers in the Arts and as a trustee of the Aon Funds.
The Joyce Foundation is based in Chicago and “supports efforts to strengthen public policies in ways that improve the quality of life in the Great Lakes region.”
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Spencer Foundation
The Spencer Foundation’s board of directors has elected three new members. Derek Bok, former president of Harvard University and now a law professor there, is joining the board and will assume its chairmanship in 2003. Lyle Logan, senior vice president of the Northern Trust Corporation, and Richard Shavelson, professor of education and psychology at Stanford University, will also be joining the board for five-year terms of service.
Established in 1971, the Spencer Foundation in Chicago focuses on education research. Its assets at the end of fiscal year 2001 were $435 million.
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Wallace-Reader’s Digest Funds
Nancy Devine has joined the Wallace-Reader’s Digest Funds as director of communities programs, a project aimed at enhancing learning opportunities in local communities. Devine’s previous work has included positions at the Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone and the New York State Housing Finance Agency, as well as serving as New York City Mayor David Dinkins’ director of housing coordination.
The DeWitt Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund and the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund are based in New York and support “education, communities, and the arts.” At the end of 2000, they reported combined assets of $1.6 billion.
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Charles Stewart Mott Foundation
A. Marshall Acuff Jr. has been elected to the board of trustees of the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. Acuff recently retired from Salomon Smith Barney in Richmond, Virginia, where he was a senior vice president and managing director. He has served on the foundation’s investment committee for the past year, a position he will continue.
The Mott Foundation was founded in 1926 in Flint, Michigan. Its assets—$2.9 billion at the close of 2000—go to support “projects that promote a just, equitable, and sustainable society.”
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Carnegie Hero Fund Commission
The Carnegie Hero Fund Commission has announced the election of Mark Laskow as its president. Laskow is CEO of Greycourt & Co. in Pittsburgh and has served on the Commission’s finance and executive committees.
The commission awards the Carnegie Medal throughout the United States and Canada “to persons who risk their lives to an extraordinary degree while saving or attempting to save the lives of others.” Since its 1904 establishment by Andrew Carnegie, the Commission has recognized 8,500 “heroes of civilization” and has granted over $25 million to them or their survivors. It ended 2000 with assets of $33.7 million.
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James Irvine Foundation
Mary G. F. Bitterman has been appointed president and CEO of the James Irvine Foundation in San Francisco. Bitterman had been serving as president and CEO of the San Francisco public broadcasting station KQED, a position she had held since 1993.
The foundation was founded in 1937 by James Irvine. Its $1.5 billion in assets are “dedicated to enhancing the social, economic, and physical quality of life throughout California, and to enriching the state’s intellectual and cultural environment.”
