Letter from the Editors

From experience, we have discovered that if you know one family foundation, you know one family foundation. Each one is unique to the family members behind it, but they all have one thing in common: a story.  

Founders often take their stories for granted assuming the next generation will think their narratives are ancient history. But we’ve heard time and again that it’s more than the story itself that’s valuable, it’s the activity of passing the story from one generation to the next which is the prime step in conveying family and philanthropic legacy.

The idea of conveying stories has long been a part of our society and more prevalent in the philanthropic world in the last ten years. Since 1998, Paul Schervish and John Havens’ research on the “wealth transfer” has prepared families for the inevitable conveyance of philanthropic and other financial resources from the Traditionalists (born between 1925 and 1945) to the Baby Boomers (born between 1945 and 1965) and their adult Generation X (born between 1965 and 1980) and Generation Y (born between 1980 and 2000) children.  Motivated by this forthcoming wealth transfer, families are coming to terms with their “inheritances” beyond the dollars – long before the wills are read – and are inviting the next generation to participate in family philanthropy.  

Compounding this philanthropic planning is the reality that people are living longer and multiple generations of family members are engaging in philanthropic conversations at the same time.  While a man born in the United States in 1900 could have expected to live until the age of 47, today’s average life spans are increasing to 79 years for men and 82 years for women.  No longer do we see foundations being passed from one generation to the next like batons in a relay race; instead, multiple generations – grandparents, parents and grandchildren – are engaging in philanthropy at the same time.

Given these changes in the philanthropic and demographic landscapes, families are exhibiting an increased demand for resources that can help them to articulate and convey their values and visions across the generations.  In an effort to meet that demand, we have created the Grandparent Legacy Project, a resource to highlight and facilitate the communication of philanthropic legacies.

So why have we focused on grandparents?  Simple: despite tensions that may exist between parents and children, sisters and brothers, or cousins across family branches, nine times out of ten, grandparents share unique and special relationships with their grandchildren.

We witnessed this time and again as we traveled across the United States to interview people for The Grandparent Legacy Project, as individuals and couples sat with us for hours to tell their stories and share the legacies they wished to leave their grandchildren.

We met Rita and Stanley Kaplan, founders of the Stanley H. Kaplan Educational Center, the world's leading institution to prepare students for standardized entrance exams; Jean Schulz, widow of Charles Schulz, creator of the beloved Peanuts cartoon strip; Dr. David Satcher, former U.S. Surgeon General; Buddy Mayer, daughter of Nathan Cummings and heir to the Sara Lee Corporation; Shirley Fredricks, daughter of well-known entertainer Lawrence Welk; and more.  From one to the next, they had a fountain of stories about the people who had made impressions on their lives and about the messages they received regarding giving and helping others, and each offered these stories generously to their grandchildren, unencumbered by by-laws or codicils, full of unconditional love.

The stories featured in the pages that follow are terrific in and of themselves, but they are also meant to be a myriad of models to inspire the range of people who can use this resource. Whether you read all of the stories, listen to the audio versions from the CD at the back or just choose to focus on the chapters that speak to you, we hope you will become inspired to utilize the Grandparent Legacy Project to convey or capture your own philanthropic legacy.

The Grandparent Legacy Project can be used in a variety of ways; here are a few suggestions:

• Read the stories of 15 inspiring individuals and couples who describe how they convey their philanthropic legacies to their grandchildren and future generations.

• Hear the voices of those 15 by listening to the audio CD at the back of the book.

• Visit www.grandparentlegacyproject.org to download the interviews as podcasts.

• Utilize the User Guide and corresponding workbook at the back to conduct an interview with your grandparent, grandchild or another family member.

• Experiment with some of the suggestions for how to convey or capture your philanthropic legacy.

We are always interested in hearing your feedback on how our resources inform your generational conversations; please don’t hesitate to be in touch.  And enjoy!

Sincerely,

Sharna Goldseker                        Timothy Walter
21/64                                          Association of Small Foundations
www.2164.net                              www.smallfoundations.org