…ant relatives) to the Cleveland Foundation. During 60 years of unremitting toil—later in life she had cleaned offices in downtown Cleveland and washed laundry in her three rented rooms—she had accumulated well over $10,000. Prudently invested in blue-chip stocks, Bohm’s nest egg would be worth more than $150,000 today. Bohm had been almost completely blind as a result of inoperable cataracts when she died, just a few days before her 80th…
…rged a new path in institutionalizing a collaborative relationship between the board and staff. Because program officers do the legwork on grants, Minter perceived that the board of directors often felt that they were merely rubber-stamping others’ decisions. He envisioned a far more active role for the trustees. He wanted to see their intelligence and experience brought to bear on major policy decisions. Immediately upon his appointment, Minter…
…le until 1990. He retired as chairman in 1991. In 1978, Vail launched the New Cleveland Campaign to promote the area’s many cultural, entertainment and industrial assets. He co-founded Cleveland Tomorrow (now the Greater Cleveland Partnership), a group of business leaders who work to improve the city’s building and industrial base by bringing business and government together. He has served as a trustee of the Cleveland Clinic Foundation,…
…er the news that an 11th-hour contribution of $150,000 from the estate of Samuel Mather, who had died a few months before, had not pushed the campaign over the top. Then Carl W. Brand took the podium. A Cleveland Foundation trustee, he announced the foundation’s contribution of $75,000, arranged that very day. With the foundation’s timely intervention, the Community Fund surpassed its goal by $30,000, enabling the welfare federation to fully…
…ls, museums, stadiums, a convention center and a medical technology showplace. The Cleveland Foundation supported many of these endeavors, typically by providing planning, site analysis or design grants or supplementing construction budgets with funding for public amenities. The foundation also facilitated improvements in downtown infrastructure and downtown transportation, providing planning grants for a county-wide Regional Transit Authority…
…rategic plan. Among CPAC’s many subsequent accomplishments, none was more critical than its championship of public financing of the arts and culture, an endeavor endorsed by a $300,000 Cleveland Foundation grant in 2003 (see video). At the dawn of the new millennium, Cuyahoga County had among the lowest levels of public support for the sector of any peer community. CPAC initiated conversations with the county commissioners that led to their…
…ter had become involved as a trustee or officer with an impressive list of area organizations, including the Adult Education Association, Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, Cleveland Music School Settlement, Cuyahoga County Home Rule Association, Ohio School Survey Commission and the YMCA. He taught at the YMCA’s Cleveland School of Technology, a predecessor of today’s Cleveland State University, for 34 years, staying on to conduct evening courses…
…ive and longtime resident of Findlay, Ohio, turned over his life savings to the Cleveland Foundation upon his death in 1976. The disposition, as well as the size, of Dorney’s $5 million estate — the equivalent of $20 million today — no doubt surprised those of his neighbors and associates who mistook for stinginess this bachelor’s frugality. Dorney, who was born in 1866, had no television or refrigerator. He preferred to spend his free time…
…undation’s board, explained that GCAF would dedicate itself to exploring “possible solutions to broad problems that are too extensive and too costly to be attacked by existing organizations, which must concentrate on solving today’s urgent problems today.” Although legally a nonprofit Ohio corporation with its own staff and 11-member board, GCAF was technically a new trust fund of the Cleveland Foundation. “All of its funds will go for studying…
…rade—Moley favored a certain degree of protectionism—prompted the assistant secretary’s resignation in September 1933. He soon found new bully pulpits as a syndicated political journalist and the editor of the weekly journal Today (which later merged with Newsweek). When he left the Cleveland Foundation, Moley said that he regretted the move because he considered Cleveland “in many ways the most progressive city in America.” Later in life, he…