Health and Human Services Funds
ABLE Wheelchair Sports Fund for Children
Established 1999As part of his estate planning, John Mayfield started an endowment as a surprise for his good friend, Rick Slaughter. Rick, who is in a wheelchair, runs ABLE (Athletes Building Life Experiences) which introduces children in wheelchairs to all types of sports, such as basketball, tennis and skiing. The program helps children become independent in all of their daily activities.
A Cause for Celebration Fund
Established 1998The A Cause for Celebration Fund wants to ensure that every child, even those living in difficult circumstances, knows that they are celebrated. Currently, the Fund provides birthday parties for mothers and children living at the YW’s Domestic Violence Shelter. Contributions of any size are welcome to perpetuate the joy that this Fund supplies.
The Angel Fund
Established 2007The Angel Fund enables some incredible public servants or "angels" working in the nonprofit sector to help people in need. These "angels" invest in critical intervention points in the lives of people they serve. An example is the woman who secures a job as a waitress as she reenters the workforce but lacks the $75 to buy the uniform she needs. Whether it's eye glasses for a family who cannot afford them or bus passes for the man trying to get to work, our expectation is that gifts, of any amount, succeed in helping people over a hump in their lives.
Alive Hospice Endowment Fund
Established 1992Alive Hospice has been offering physical, psychological and spiritual support to people with life-threatening illnesses and their families since 1975. It is the oldest and largest nonprofit, community-based hospice in Middle Tennessee. As a nonprofit agency, Alive Hospice provides end-of-life care to anyone from any socioeconomic, ethnic, racial, and religious background regardless of ability to pay.
The Hunter Armistead Fund to Inspire Joy and Laughter
Established 1999Ashland City Ministerial Alliance Designated Fund/The Bethesda Center
Established 1999The Ashland City Ministerial Alliance of Churches in Cheatham County supervises the ministry of the Bethesda Center. Established in 1999 by John E. Mayfield, this Fund serves the needy in Cheatham County by providing a thrift store, a food bank and financial assistance. The Bethesda Center encourages others to donate to this Fund to ensure that their essential services can continue for future generations.
Bonnie R. Bashford Fund
Established 2008According to her friends and family, Nashvillian Bonnie Bashford loved life and lived every moment to its fullest. Bonnie, an employee of Social Security, appreciated the value of giving back and believed in sharing the bounty of her life. So, in her Will, she left The Community Foundation her home and much of her estate to create the Bonnie R. Bashford Fund to assist underprivileged people working to obtain an education and/or housing.
Susan Warner Batt Fund for Breast Cancer
Established 2003Susan Warner Batt died in 2002 at age 45 after a two-year battle with breast cancer. During Susan’s battle, her husband, Charles Batt, and their children, Derek, Lizzy and Janie, were blessed with such overwhelming acts of thoughtfulness and kindness that they wanted, in their own way, to help others with this disease. So they established the Susan Warner Batt Fund for Breast Cancer to support and help breast cancer patients, awareness and research.
Bethlehem Centers of Nashville Endowment Fund
Established 2007Lillian G. and Dave Bogatzky Field-of-Interest Fund
Established 2003When Lillian Bogatzky fought for a visa, she literally saved the life of her late husband’s nephew trapped in war-torn Poland during World War II. Records show he was one of only 250 people from Poland to enter the United States in 1938. In thanksgiving for the love he received from his Aunt Lil and Uncle Dave, he established a Fund to perpetuate the spirit of making someone’s life possible. The proceeds from the Fund will be used to serve disadvantaged children and seniors, populations he sees as society’s most vulnerable, just as he was when Aunt Lil stepped in.
Boys & Girls Clubs of Middle Tennessee Endowment Fund
Established 2001The Boys & Girls Clubs of Middle Tennessee has positively impacted the lives of thousands of Nashville’s youth for more than 100 years. Its eight sites serve a culturally and economically diverse youth population, ages 6-18. It is open to the public, and no one is ever turned away because of an inability to pay. The Clubs give kids a safe place to learn and grow with life enhancing programs and character development.
Breast Cancer Research Fund
Established 2000A survivor of breast cancer for over 25 years, the donor who created this Fund stipulated that the proceeds be used to support breast cancer research conducted at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Remembering when breast cancer was not discussed, she hopes there will be again a day when no one talks about the illness because a cure has been found.
Breast Cancer Research Fund
Established 2000A survivor of breast cancer for over 25 years, the donor who created this Fund stipulated that the proceeds be used to support breast cancer research conducted at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Remembering when breast cancer was not discussed, she hopes there will be again a day when no one talks about the illness because a cure has been found.
The Father John Nolan Cain Fund to Benefit the Roman Catholic Dioceses of Nashville
Established 2005CASA of Nashville Endowment Fund
Established 2000CASA, Inc., established in Nashville in 1984, provides trained community volunteers to advocate for abused, neglected or abandoned children — with no place to call home — who find themselves lost in never-ending court battles. Court Appointed Special Advocates provide a voice in court for these vulnerable children and help them find safe, permanent homes. This Fund helps ensure the
Center for Nonprofit Management Endowment Fund
Established 2009Centerstone Endowment Fund in Honor of Elle P. Hayes
Established 2005Tennessee’s leading provider of behavioral health services has taken a major step to ensure the future of community behavioral health care throughout its service area by establishing this Fund. The Fund will support the research and infrastructure necessary to bring new treatments to clients and to provide universal access to those in the community who cannot afford behavioral healthcare.
Clarksville Montgomery County Ajax Turner Senior Citizen Center, Inc. Endowment Fund
Established 2004The senior center, created in 1963, has grown from just a location for recreation to one of Middle Tennessee’s largest and most complete centers. Its estimated 2,500+ annual participants enjoy daily breakfasts and lunches, a wide range of educational classes including a large computer lab, physical activities, homebound services, an onsite adult day care center, and weekend live-band dances. This Fund will help ensure the continuation of the center for future generations.
Paula and Bob Covington Quality of Life
Established 2007Crisis Intervention Center Endowment Fund
Established 1999Since 1968 Crisis Intervention Center worked to prevent suicide, to empower individuals to face life challenges, and to meet basic and emergency needs. The Crisis Intervention Center (now part of Family & Children’s Service) provides skilled, compassionate crisis intervention and outreach that includes support groups for those whose loved ones have died by suicide, direct advocacy and information and referral for more than 4,300 social and other community services through the 2-1-1 Information and Referral Service.
Crittenton Fund
Established 2001For 127 years, the Florence Crittenton Home for Unwed Mothers helped teen mothers and their babies and provided teen pregnancy prevention services. In 2001, the board of directors, aware that there were duplicative providers for their services, made the difficult decision to find “adoptive parents” for their programs and to close the agency’s doors. They established the Crittenton Fund at The Community Foundation in order to make grants to programs providing teen pregnancy prevention services to pregnant, parenting, and at-risk youth, and to ensure that the gifts given in support of the agency remained dedicated to the causes to which donors were committed.
Cumberland County Cardiac-Pulmonary Rehabilitation Alumni Endowment Fund
Established 1999Cumberland County Cardiac-Pulmonary Rehabilitation Alumni, Inc. provides assistance in covering the cost of cardiac or pulmonary rehabilitation for those who do not have insurance or those who need help paying deductibles or co-payments. The Cumberland County Cardiac-Pulmonary Rehabilitation Alumni have generated money through fundraisers since 1997, but an Endowment Fund was established to ensure the future and meet the demands of a growing population.
Cumberland Heights Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2004Cumberland Heights is a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of those facing addictions by providing in-patient and out-patient rehabilitation. This Endowment Fund was made possible by a grateful Cumberland Heights donor who faced personal challenges and, with the agency’s assistance, was able to overcome addiction.
Sister Patrick Curren Designated Fund For St Anthony’s Mission in San Francisco
Established 2007Lisa DeFrancis Memorial Nurses' Fund
Established 2007Lisa DeFrancis was an artist. The graphic designer that she was, she cared about the construction and the look of everything around her. Most of all she cared about her family. She got to see her youngest turn six, but not seven. She got to see her oldest daughter go to college but not graduate. She got to be 46, but not 47 years old. What she noticed was caring and because of the great care she received from nurses as a cancer patient, she established the Lisa DeFrancis Memorial Fund which provides annual grants through The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee to nurses needing respite.
Clarise Ann DeQuasie Fund
Established 2003The stereotypical person we presume works in libraries would never ride a motorcycle to work each day or charm her way into an abiding friendship with a celebrity — but Clarise DeQuasie was not easily pigeon-holed. She had a passion for life, for animals, for people in pain, and for Luciano Pavarotti. Clarise became ill and died at the age of 63 in 2001. In her Will, she bequeathed her Pavarotti collection to Vanderbilt, and she established a Fund within The Community Foundation to benefit Alive Hospice and Walden’s Puddle. Each year, because Clarise cared, orphaned and injured wild animals will be rehabilitated through Walden’s Puddle, and the dying and their families will receive support through the staff of Alive Hospice.
Discovery Place Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2008Alcoholism and drug addiction are challenges that confront this community today and are likely to for years to come. Discovery Place is a residential program in Burns, TN that offers the means and environment for men to refocus their lives on a path of recovery, spirituality and productivity through the methods outlined in the long-established Twelve Step tradition. In so doing, it draws on the talents of a staff who all have quality sobriety time and share their experience, strength and hope with the men in the program. This Fund exists so that Discovery Place will always be able to offer its treatment services to men taking positive steps for an improved quality of life.
Domestic Violence Program Inc. Endowment Fund
Established 2007Martha Jean Dorris Helping Hand Fund
Established 2006Martha Jean Dorris’ motivations were pure; she simply wanted to help — to reach out to those in need of a hand. And so she created this Fund to endow support for nonprofits which help individuals of all ages and from all backgrounds who are living in impoverished conditions and who demonstrate a desire to strive for a better, more meaningful life.
Down Syndrome Association of Middle Tennessee Agency Endowment
Established 2004The mission of the Down Syndrome Association of Middle Tennessee is to enhance the lives of individuals with Down syndrome by providing support, information and education to them and their families. This Fund creates a permanent endowment to ensure programs and services.
Easter Seals Endowment Fund
Established 1997Creating solutions that change the lives of children and adults with disabilities or other special needs and their families, Easter Seals provides a network of services throughout Tennessee, including health and fitness; camping and recreation; job training and employment; and physical, occupational and speech therapy. Easter Seals’ programs provide opportunities for children and adults with disabilities to engage as fully as possible in family and community life, education, work and recreation.
Exchange Club Family Center Endowment Fund
Established 1996The Exchange Club Family Center, Inc. was established in 1985 to prevent child abuse and improve the lives of families in Middle Tennessee. The Center’s services include parent education, in-home case management, safe exchanges and supervised visitation, education and awareness. This endowment ensures the children of tomorrow will be protected from abuse and neglect, and families will be strengthened for generations to come.
Exchange Club/Stephens Center Child Abuse Prevention Endowment Fund
Established 2000The Exchange Club/Stephens Center was established in 1988 with the mission of preventing child abuse and neglect in the Upper Cumberland area. The Center identifies families who are at-risk of child abuse or neglect and then offers appropriate services, including home-visitation programs, parent education classes, community education activities, a community resource closet, and 24-hour on-call access for families needing support or assistance. The Fund will help ensure the continued availability of caring, responsive, community-based efforts for child abuse prevention.
Family & Children’s Service Endowment Fund
Established 1996The mission of Family & Children’s Service is to give real help for real hurt right now. For more than 64 years they have provided trauma counseling for children and adolescents who are witnesses or victims of violence; Crisis Center counseling; clinical assessments; consultation and training for foster and adoptive parents to help special needs children find loving homes; and free and sliding scale counseling for at-risk youth, welfare to work families and those who could not otherwise afford mental health care.
First Steps, Inc. Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2005The mission of First Steps, Inc. is to educate and care for infant to kindergarten-aged children with special needs and medical conditions alongside their typically developing peers in an inclusive environment. With this Fund, First Steps can continue its nearly 50-year history in the Nashville community of serving children and their families, many of whom are often turned away from other programs because of the severity of their health issues and/or limited resources.
Fitz Family Fund for Brain Cancer Awareness and Research
Established 2008Julianne and Earl Fitz created this Fund in honor of their four children, Ezra, Caitlin, Dylan, and Duncan, who learned firsthand from their parents the value of giving back and now make a difference in each of their communities around the country. When the Fitz’s oldest son, Ezra, was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2006, Julianne and Earl found a cause that needed and deserved their support. We all hope that in the months and years ahead, research being done at Vanderbilt and elsewhere will find the keys – and the cures – necessary to alleviate brain cancer. And, that greater awareness might lead to earlier diagnosis and, in turn, better outcomes. But until this happens, The Fitz Family Fund will be raising awareness about brain cancer, supporting research, and helping patients and their families find respite. All while hoping to be able, one day, after this battle is won, to move on to helping eradicate other cancers.
The Fund for Food Security
Established 2006Issues of hunger are broader than the next meal or the next food basket. Those harsh realities are critical and must be addressed, but they are the “symptoms,” not the “disease.” The Fund for Food Security is about the bigger issues, about working toward a community where people need no longer fear or worry about where their next meal is coming from. It’s about feeling secure enough that you need no longer worry about food, you can worry about your job and your life. The Fund supports organizations actively addressing food-related efforts, including educating the public about the relationship between food, nutrition and health; encouraging proper food distribution; and addressing the root causes of hunger and food insecurity.
Dr. Henry Foster Endowment Fund to Benefit I Have a Future
Established 1999I Have a Future is a comprehensive teenage pregnancy prevention program that works with male and female youth, 10 to 18 years of age, who reside primarily in the inner-city community houses of Davidson County. The program motivates by preparing youth for college, vocational careers and the immediate job market. Integral to this mission is an increase in their awareness of social and health issues and family values that strengthen the self-esteem necessary to avoid teen pregnancy and other destructive behaviors.
The Charlotte and George Fox Designated Fund
Established 2004With their lives touched by Parkinson’s disease, Charlotte and George Fox worked in many ways to bolster efforts to find and fund a cure. This Endowment Fund will benefit the Middle Tennessee Chapter of the American Parkinson’s Disease Association and its work to find a cure.
Patricia C. and Thomas F. Frist, Jr. Fund for United Way of America
Established 1996United Way brings people and organizations together to create communities where individuals, families and neighborhoods thrive. This Fund is a vehicle for Dr. and Mrs. Frist to perpetuate their support of the United Way’s charitable goals on a national level.
Friends of Tennessee Infant Parent Services (TIPS) Middle Tennessee Chapter Endowment Fund
Established 2003Imagine the fear and confusion of parents when they discover their young child has developmental problems. Fortunately, these parents can turn to Tennessee Infant Parent Services (TIPS). TIPS provides in-home services on a weekly basis to families of infants and toddlers who are hearing and/or vision impaired, or have other challenges. TIPS works in partnership with parents to provide the knowledge, skills and support to encourage the growth and development of young children with special needs. In the years to come, this Fund will provide monetary support for this vital service.
Genesco — Helping People Get Back on Their Feet Fund
Established 1999Sometimes life just knocks you down, and you have to pick yourself up and get back on your feet. The Genesco — Helping People Get Back On Their Feet Fund of The Community Foundation makes grants in support of people who are trying to follow a better path in life, and the nonprofits that serve them. The beneficiaries include programs which help people escape the ravages of substance abuse, help people living on the streets find the shelter they deserve, help people return or retrain to enter the workforce, and help people escape the horrors of domestic violence.
Gilda’s Club Nashville Agency Endowment
Established 1998Free of charge to everyone, Gilda’s Club Nashville provides a gathering place where men, women and children with cancer and their families and friends can join with others to actively involve themselves in building social and emotional support as a supplement to regular medical care. Its purpose is to offer members lectures, workshops, classes, support groups, and social activities in a non-residential, home-like setting.
Girl Scout Council of Middle Tennessee Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2005Through this Fund, the board of directors of the Girl Scout Council of Middle Tennessee wishes to permanently endow its organization to continue its mission to help girls find courage by exploring new adventures, confidence by discovering their abilities, character by shaping their values, and connections by forming friendships with other girls.
Gordon Jewish Community Center Endowment Fund
Established 1994The Gordon Jewish Community Center is the center of Jewish life in Nashville, providing recreational, educational, social, and cultural programs and services to more than 1,700 member families. The GJCC proudly reaches out to its non-Jewish neighbors, inviting everyone in the community to join, play and learn together, regardless of religious affiliation. Their purpose has changed little in the over one hundred years since its founding: to enrich lives and strengthen community.
Hands On Nashville/Hal Cato Endowment Fund
Established 1996Hands On Nashville creates and provides meaningful opportunities for people to transform their community through volunteer service. Last year the agency led over 850 volunteer projects, connecting 24,000 volunteers to community needs in agencies and schools. As a way of recognizing founder Hal Cato’s invaluable leadership in creating Hands On Nashville, the board of directors established this Fund in his name.
Helping Children Heal: A Fund for the Healing Arts
Established 2004Wendy Kanter, Marna McKinney and Garth Whitcombe developed this Fund so that sick children might take part in a wide range of healing including massage, arts and crafts, music, play therapy, laughter, and reading/storytelling. Grants are made to institutions serving children in hopes that through these activities, their lives may be made easier, if even for a moment.
Happy Hills Youth Ranch Endowment Fund
Established 2000Happy Hills Youth Ranch, set among the rolling hills of Cheatham County, was founded in 1970 to provide homes for neglected, dependent, and abused school-aged children. Happy Hills offers educational opportunities, a family-centered approach to personal and group counseling, recreation, and spiritual training. Children attend area churches and are involved in numerous programs designed to aid in personal, social and spiritual development. This Fund will produce revenue to aid the Ranch in its important service to disadvantaged youth.
High Pressure Laminate Field-of-Interest Fund
Established 2007The Hilltoppers Endowment Fund
Established 1999Hilltoppers, Inc. is a community provider of day and residential services and support for adults with mental retardation in Crossville and Cumberland County, Tennessee.
Carroll Hines Fund for Medical Needs of Children
Established 2001With great compassion and concern for the welfare of children, the Hines family set up this Fund to endow support of programs addressing the health and medical needs of children.
The Hope Fund
Established 2000Carlene Hunt, an avid and talented photographer, sees beauty in the mothers and children at Renewal House and the SISTER program at Meharry as the women work to overcome addiction. Carlene volunteers to take family pictures so they can see just how good recovery looks on them. Those images have helped strengthen the vision and value of family for many women. As an extension of her work with these programs, Carlene created The Hope Fund to help benefit a variety of programs that promote recovery from addiction — especially those efforts that address the stigma of addiction, a major barrier to women receiving the proper treatment.
Cora Mathews Horn Fund for Families
Established 2008Cora Horn, widowed at age 25 with two children, benefited greatly from the generosity of Nashvillians during the 1930’s and strongly believed in returning that generosity to others in need. As a result of Cora’s enormous personal resourcefulness and the well-timed help of others, she was able to see her children and grandchildren succeed far beyond her means. So that other families might experience the same compassion and helping hands, Cora’s grandchildren established this Fund to endow The Angel Fund of The Community Foundation and its work to do what others did for Cora, give people a hand during critical times of need to help them overcome life’s hurdles.
The Hospital Hospitality House Endowment Fund
Established 1996Founded in 1974, the Hospital Hospitality House provides a “home away from home” for families and patients facing a medical crisis. HHH provides a vital retreat from the stress of keeping a constant vigil at the side of a loved one, by offering our guests lodging, meals and supportive services. HHH is helping to ensure its future and expand its ability to serve through this Endowment Fund.
Humanities Tennessee Endowment Fund
Established 1999For nearly 30 years, Humanities Tennessee has been a leader in creating civic dialogue and public programming in the humanities across the state. Among its initiatives are grants in support of humanities programs; Teacher Awards for outstanding teachers of the humanities; Museums on Main Street, which promotes a broader and deeper understanding of Tennessee’s history and cultural life; the Southern Festival of Books; a family literacy program; and a week-long summer program at Austin Peay State University. Humanities Tennessee also makes grants for film, video and radio programs on southern history and culture.
Infant Mortality Reduction Fund
Established 2008Interfaith Dental Clinic Endowment Fund
Established 2001The Interfaith Dental Clinic makes smiles bright by providing affordable dental care for low-income, working families without dental insurance and by allowing them to pay on a sliding scale. Interfaith treats more than 1,100 patients each year, restoring their oral health and teaching them the hygiene skills needed to maintain a happy smile. Establishment of the Interfaith Dental Clinic Endowment Fund ensures that patients will continue to leave the program with enhanced physical health, improved employability and, best of all, the self-esteem that a beautiful smile affords.
Mary Jones Memorial Fund to Benefit the Tennessee Breast Cancer Coalition
Established 2000When Mary Jones died of breast cancer, her friends honored her memory by creating a Fund to benefit the Tennessee Breast Cancer Coalition. The coalition’s mission is to provide assistance and education to Tennesseans facing breast cancer and to advocate for advancements in medical research and legislative action regarding breast cancer. Mary’s Fund will provide an ongoing source of much needed support to help TBCC achieve its goals of saving lives as quickly as possible.
Junior Achievement of Middle Tennessee Endowment Fund
Established 1995Junior Achievement provides students in Middle Tennessee with programs to help them understand the relationship between what they learn in school and their successful participation in our economy, with an emphasis placed on at-risk children.
Legal Aid Society Endowment Fund
Established 1998For nearly 40 years, Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands has provided free legal representation and education so that low-income people in our community can obtain necessities such as health care, housing, income, protection from family violence, and access to basic goods and services. The benefits of Legal Aid Society’s work reach beyond individual clients. By ensuring equal justice for low-income people, the whole community is strengthened.
Alice and John Lindahl, Jr. Fund to Benefit The Middle Tennessee Council of the Boy Scouts of America Venturing Program
Established 2005The Venturing Program is a youth development program of the Boy Scouts of America for young men and women ages 14-20. Venturing partners with religious and civic organizations to provide positive experiences in the outdoors to help young people mature and become responsible, caring adults. This Fund was established to provide funding for the Venturing Program.
Loaves and Fishes of Clarksville, TN Agency Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2006Hot meals for Clarksville’s homeless, six days a week is the mission of Loaves and Fishes of Clarksville. To ensure they can always live up to this commitment, Loaves and Fishes has established this Agency Endowment Fund to provide it a steady stream of income over time.
Lupus Foundation Endowment Fund
Established 1998The Lupus Foundation promotes research and provides information, education and support for patients with Lupus Erythematosus, an autoimmune disease that can cause chronic inflammation affecting various parts of the body. Since one in every 185 Americans is diagnosed with Lupus each year, this Fund was created to ensure compassionate support of Middle Tennesseans living with this disease.
Magdalene, Inc. Agency Endowment
Established 2005Magdalene is a residential housing and recovery program for Nashville women with a criminal history of prostitution and drug abuse. Through this endowment, Magdalene seeks to provide lasting support for its mission to improve social functioning and physical, emotional and spiritual health. By providing safe housing, Magdalene helps women recover from addiction, reunite with families, and earn legal employment at a living wage.
William Thomas McHugh Fund to benefit the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and The Cumberlands
Established 2008Bill McHugh was a “lawyer’s lawyer” who practiced his noble profession with skill and integrity for more than 55 years. To honor her late husband’s legacy of dedication to the legal profession, Lou McHugh used proceeds from the sale of the McHugh’s family property in Robertson County, Tennessee, to establish this Fund supporting a series of free “walk-in” pro bono clinics, named for Mr. McHugh, within the Legal Aid Society to provide free legal services to low-income individuals and families.
McNeilly Center for Children Endowment Fund
Established 2008For more than 100 years, McNeilly Center for Children has nurtured children’s development and helped families thrive. Providing quality, affordable child care to Nashville families with parents who are working, in job training, or in school, McNeilly promotes the physical, social, emotional and cognitive development of young children during crucial developmental years, while supporting families with parenting education and social services. This Fund will help ensure McNeilly can continue this work for years to come.
McWherter Fund for Basic Human Needs
Established 2004Governor Ned Ray McWherter could have easily continued down the path of civic leader and businessman, multiplying his personal and financial success manyfold. But instead, he decided to give back to his community and to people in need by dedicating his career to public service. This Fund was created upon Governor McWherter’s acceptance of the 2004 Joe Kraft Humanitarian Award and supports nonprofit organizations serving our neighbors in need. Food, shelter, clothing and a wide range of other basic needs are provided as a result of his kindness.
Mid-Cumberland Community Action Agency Endowment Fund
Established 1999The Mid-Cumberland Community Action Agency was chartered in 1971 to respond to the pressing problems faced by low-income people, while seeking new and effective ways to combat the causes and effects of poverty. Through the years, numerous initiatives have been added, such as Head Start, Nutrition Self-Help, Senior Companionship, and others.
Miriam F. Moore Fund to benefit Compassion International
Established 2005Mrs. Eula Moore is the picture of dedication. She spent half of her life caring for her only daughter, Miriamme, after she was diagnosed with polio. It is now, after her daughter’s death, that she has turned to The Community Foundation to create a lasting legacy for the child she nurtured for so many years.
Miriamme Moore was 14 years old when she was diagnosed with polio. It was 1955, and much of the general public was unable to receive a vaccine because the medication was earmarked only for infants, pregnant women and the elderly. Struggling for her life in the first year of the disease, Miriamme made a recovery, but the polio left her paralyzed from the waist down. The paralysis was a life sentence, but Miriamme found a way to make an unfortunate situation better. Eula, dedicated mother and caretaker, worked diligently to ensure Miriamme received the best care, bringing in tutors to help Miriamme receive her high school diploma.
She was accepted in the 1960s to Vanderbilt University to study language. Rain, shine, sleet or snow, Eula would rise in the morning and help Miriamme get dressed and ready for the day at Vanderbilt. She would wait in her car for Miriamme’s classes to adjourn, and then help her to the next classroom. She did this for many years, as Miriamme went on to receive her Ph.D.
Miriamme taught foreign language at McGavock High School. She spoke five languages fluently, and many of her students went on to receive awards in state competitions for language. In 2005 Miriamme Moore passed away at the age of 63 from complications of polio. Eula, still living in Donelson at 92, set up the Miriamme F. Moore Fund for Compassion International so that her daughter’s memory and legacy would live on in perpetuity. The Fund benefits Compassion International, an organization benefiting the well-being of children throughout the world, a cause near and dear to Miriamme’s heart.
Nacarato Family Fund to Benefit Families
Established 2000This Fund is intended to permanently endow assistance to families and children in need, such as those who are without food, clothing, medical assistance, or shelter. It will also benefit children who have lost their parents.
NAMI Nashville/Eddie Flynn Memorial Endowment Fund
Established 1999One in five families in the United States is affected by brain disorders (mental illness). NAMI Nashville is dedicated to improving the quality of life for an estimated 30,000 people in the Nashville area with these disorders. NAMI Nashville provides emotio
Nashville Area Association of Family & Consumer Sciences Endowment
Established 2005In 1948, Miss Lucy Fellis Dye founded the Nashville Area Home Economics Association for women with degrees in home economics. The association grew, and by 1976 they published “The Nashville Cookbook.” The proceeds from the cookbook are used to fund the NAAFCS, formerly the Lucy Fellis Dye Fund. NAAFCS benefits several Tennessee counties by providing money for scholarships, grants, conferences, leadership development, etc.
Nashville Area Chapter of the American Red Cross Designated Fund
Established 2001Every day, the Red Cross provides relief to victims of disasters and helps people prevent, prepare for, and respond to emergencies. Although a nongovernmental agency, the Red Cross continually steps in as a part of federal, state and local disaster plans. Among its many contributions to our community are teaching skills like CPR and First Aid, providing vision and hearing screenings, and the vital collection and distribution of blood and blood products.
Nashville Area Childhood Immunization Fund
Established 1994The Nashville Childhood Immunization Fund supports organizations committed to promoting the value of timely childhood immunizations in keeping with the original tenets of the Nashville Immunization Coalition, through which it began.
Nashville Area Habitat for Humanity
Established 2004The Nashville Area Habitat for Humanity was created in 1985 with a mission to provide families in need with the life-changing opportunity of buying a decent, affordable home. The Nashville Area Habitat for Humanity created this Endowment Fund as a way to continue their mission to build single family homes in partnership with low-income families.
Nashville CARES Endowment Fund
Established 1999Nashville CARES has been meeting the challenges of AIDS in Middle Tennessee since 1985, educating youth and adults about how to prevent HIV infection, as well as providing services to support the continued independence and self-sufficiency of those infected. CARES services are provided free-of-charge, and this Fund helps ensure that programs will continue to be available to any Middle Tennessean in need, until a cure is found.
Margaret and Victor Nielsen Fund
Established 2003For school-aged children there are few experiences more memorable than summer camp. Margaret and Victor Nielsen hoped that all children could participate in this rite of summer and made a bequest through their Wills to create this Fund that provides underprivileged children with the summer camp experience.
Nonprofit Insurance Fund
Established 1995To nonprofit organizations, the horrors of an emergency such as fire or theft are made all the worse if the work that they do and the people they serve are made to suffer. The Nonprofit Insurance Fund provides interim funding to a nonprofit agency temporarily put out of business by theft or fire. Once the regular insurance policy payment arrives, the beneficiary repays the amount loaned so the Fund is replenished, and money is available for other organizations in crisis.
Not Alone Fund
Established 2008Sometimes the scars of war are visible. Sometimes they are not. Sometimes the war ends on the battlefield, but sometimes it continues even after our military comes home. This Fund was created to help address the emotional and psychological aftermath of war – for the combat warriors and for the people who support them at home and in the field. The Fund will sponsor research, curriculum design and innovative delivery mechanisms to provide aid for those affected in ways that work best for them. After all these men and women have done for our country, the least we can do is stand beside them as they battle Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and other consequences of combat stress.
Oasis Center Endowment Fund
Established 1997Oasis Center is Middle Tennessee’s only community-based organization dedicated to working exclusively with teenagers and their families. For 38 years, Oasis has provided our youth with services such as Middle Tennessee’s only emergency shelter, street outreach, educational support, Project Safe Place, individual and family counseling, and opportunities to contribute back to the community through service and leadership development. This Fund helps ensure that Oasis Center will remain a place where youth succeed for years to come.
Martha O’Bryan Foundation Endowment Fund
Established 1997For more than a century, the Martha O’Bryan Center has been dedicated to helping individuals and families living in poverty. Today, through childcare, youth education, adult basic education, job skills training, an emergency food bank, meals on wheels, and other programs, the Center empowers people to become self-sufficient and independent.
The Olive Branch Fund: A Thisbe and Noah Scott Legacy
Established 2008The Olive Branch Fund: A Thisbe and Noah Scott Legacy was founded by Franklin residents John and Laurian Scott in honor of their two children, Elenna "Thisbe" and "Noah" McArthur Scott. John and Laurian's whole world began to change when their beautiful, healthy and adorably feisty daughter, Thisbe, was 17-months-old. Symptoms of an unknown nature started haunting them, and the seeming benignity quickly snowballed into a nightmarish degeneration. Her nerve cells were dying, thus they were no longer sending messages to the muscles, telling them to move. Starting with her hearing, then her facial muscles, neck muscles, and descending to her limbs, she became paralyzed piece by piece and requiring a host of machines to keep her alive. Thisbe spent the last 18 months of her short life fraught with suffering, which she bore with unbelievable grace, fortitude, patience and love before finally and valiantly succumbing to the motor neuron disease Brown-Vialetto-Van Laere (BVVL) on April 30th, 2007. She was two months shy of her third birthday. Just one month after Thisbe's death, her healthy, precious, patient and snuggly little brother, Noah, just 10-months-old at the time, started showing one of the initial symptoms of BVVL: a droopy eyelid. He, too, started the degeneration, and he fought as only a "Manny Man" (as his parent's called him) can: full of love, purity of spirit and passion for living all things boyish. The disease took his life nine months later, on April 9th, 2008. Through a profound brokenness, the Scott's have begun the mission to raise awareness, fund research and provide support to families of all forms of pediatric motor neuron diseases. In this way, they hope to honor the amazing little lives that they were graced with in Thisbe and Noah - and to show that they mattered, not just to their parents, but to the world.
100 Black Men of Middle Tennessee Endowment Fund
Established 1997100 Black Men of Middle Tennessee, established in 1991, charged itself with the mission “to nurture and enhance the growth, development and opportunities for young black males of Middle Tennessee.” The organization is comprised of local business leaders who invest both time and resources in activities that benefit innercity youth. This Endowment serves to perpetuate the long-term commitment of the organization to the youth of Middle Tennessee by helping fund its annual programs and by making scholarships available.
Operation Warm Homes Designated Fund
Established 2005This Fund benefits 19 community agencies across Tennessee working to provide heating bill assistance to the needy and underprivileged.
OUR KIDS, Inc. Agency Endowment Fund
Established 1999OUR KIDS provides expert medical and psychosocial services for children who may have experienced sexual abuse. Each year, about 1,000 children and their families receive services from the OUR KIDS team, which stands ready 24 hours each day to help children deal with abuse. This Fund helps ensure that OUR KIDS is available to give compassionate care whenever concerns about child sexual abuse arise.
Park Center Endowment Fund
Established 2004Park Center serves individuals with mental illness through integrative services that focus on needs, choices and strength. Park Center provides employment training and placement, housing including safe havens, homeless outreach services, case management, co-occurring disorders program and support services to adults and mentally ill youth transitioning out of foster care. This Endowment Fund provides a permanent source of funding for Park Center’s programs and services.
Partners in Nursing Field-of-Interest Fund
Established 2007Pastoral Counseling Centers Endowment Fund
Established 1997With six centers in Middle Tennessee, the Pastoral Counseling Centers of Tennessee, Inc. has been providing clinical psychotherapy and counseling for individuals, couples and families; life enrichment education for organizations; training for clergy and pastoral caregivers; and staff consultation, assessment and crisis intervention since 1985. The Pastoral Counseling Centers of Tennessee Endowment Fund was created to ensure the growth of the centers and the future care of those with mental health care needs.
Penuel Ridge Contemplative Retreat Designated Fund
Established 2007Planned Parenthood Endowment Fund
Established 1994Planned Parenthood of Middle and East Tennessee proudly provides access to reproductive, sexual and complementary health care services; information in settings that preserve and protect the right to privacy; and educational programs that enhance understanding of human sexuality.
Prevent Blindness Tennessee Endowment Fund
Established 1995The mission of Prevent Blindness Tennessee is to keep the SEE in TennesSEE with Screenings, Eye exams and Education. The organization works to prevent blindness and preserve sight through a wide variety of hands-on services to the community, including vision screening for both children and adults; free eye exams and free/low-cost glasses for those in need; public and professional education; and information, referral and research.
Progress, Inc. Endowment Fund
Established 2003Progress, Inc. was founded by two families as they sought independent living arrangements for their young adult sons with developmental disabilities. In 1971, as Billy Goodman and Tommy Powelson were reaching adulthood, they expressed their desire to live independently in the community and to have the opportunity to fulfill their dreams and reach their goals just like anyone else. The Goodmans and the Powelsons realized these desires couldn’t be accomplished in a state institution, so they bought a house for Billy and Tommy to share, hired support staff and created what ultimately became the largest residential support provider in Middle Tennessee.
Rape & Sexual Abuse Center (RASAC) Endowment
Established 1998Since 1978, RASAC has been the only agency in Middle Tennessee specializing in the support and treatment of survivors of sexual assault. Annually, the Center provides individual and group counseling to 700 or more adults and children, and prevention education curriculum for 80,000 school students. To support its philosophy of always being there when needed, and never turning anyone away for lack of ability to pay, the Center established this endowment.
Reed Family Fund for Family Planning
Established 2007Renewal House Endowment Fund
Established 2000In 1996, Renewal House was founded as a long-term residential program for mothers and children in order to preserve families affected by addiction. On a daily basis, Renewal House provides safe and drug-free housing along with therapeutic services so that mothers can focus on recovery from addiction, while improving their parenting and vocational skills. In 2003, Renewal House opened a licensed Intensive Outpatient Treatment program for chemically dependent women, especially those without insurance. The Renewal House Endowment Fund is a source of hope for women and children until the disease of addiction no longer devastates the Nashville community.
Richmond Designated Fund
Established 2007W. R. Rochelle Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2007Room in the Inn/Campus for Human Development Endowment Fund
Established 1998Through the power of spirituality and the practice of love, the Campus for Human Development provides hospitality with a respect that offers hope in a community of non-violence. Their mission is to provide programs that emphasize human development and recovery to those who call the streets of Nashville home.
St. Joseph Worker Foundation, Inc. for Children and Families of Haiti Agency Endowment Fund
Established 2008In a country where extreme poverty and chaotic government have become a way of life, the St. Joseph Worker Foundation was established to benefit the people of Haiti by providing for the education, health and welfare needs of children and families. Jane and Dick Wildeman, who established this Fund, have seen the good work being done and have made a dear friend in Fr. Tijwa, who Jane affectionately calls “Haiti’s goodwill ambassador.” It is Fr. Tijwa’s parish work that makes the Haiti Student Sponsor Program (an initiative of the St. Joseph Worker Foundation, Inc. for Children and Families of Haiti Agency Endowment Fund) possible.
Senior Citizens, Inc. Endowment Fund
Established 1999Senior Citizens, Inc. is Middle Tennessee’s leading agency providing comprehensive services focused on helping older adults remain active, independent and living at home as long as possible. Through a network of senior activity centers and community-based programs, SCI serves more than 20,000 older adults, their families, and children each year.
The Shepherd’s Center Fund for Senior Adults
Established 2000As a nonprofit interfaith community organization run by senior adults for senior adults, The Shepherd’s Center worked for 10 years to improve the quality of life of those ages 55 and over in the West End area of Nashville. When it closed in 1999, its absence left a void for the many senior adults in the area. With limited funds remaining, the leadership opted to create The Shepherd’s Center Field-of-Interest Fund, which gives grants to nonprofit organizations serving senior adults in Middle Tennessee. As a result, the mission of The Shepherd’s Center — and its name and proud history — will continue in perpetuity.
Special Olympics Tennessee Endowment Fund
Established 1992Special Olympics Tennessee provides year-round sports training and competition activities for children and adults with mental disabilities. Programs are community-based, serving more than 12,000 athletes statewide and involving 9,000 volunteers. Special Olympics’ goal is to develop individual skills, physical fitness, selfesteem, and positive attitudes toward teamwork and sportsmanship. The Fund was established to ensure that the organization can meet the needs and desires of an evergrowing and expanding program.
The Michael Stanley Fund for Children’s Hospital
Established 2010The Michael Stanley Fund For Children’s Hospital benefits Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital’s Child Life Services Program. The Fund was established by The Stanley Family when they learned firsthand about the good work being done by the Child Life Program In 2005, their son, Michael, was diagnosed with embryonal rhabdomyosarcoma, an extremely rare form of cancer which had materialized in his abdomen. Michael spent more than 100 days at the Monroe Carell, Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt while being treated for his cancer. This fund will support The Child Life specialists who work with patients and their families to help them cope with their illness.
STARS/Center for Youth Issues Endowment Fund
Established 1997This Fund was established to support substance abuse treatment and prevention, violence prevention and intervention services to Middle Tennessee students.
Stewart Family Fund
Established 2000The Stewart family was composed of four unique individuals who shared only a few years together as a nuclear family. Despite the 13-year age difference between the two sons and Loura and William Stewart’s divorce after 28 years of marriage, Phillip and Billy were raised with a strong sense of family roots and an interest in family history. To celebrate the importance of family ties, Phillip Stewart created this Fund to honor the memory of his mother, father and brother. The Fund will permanently endow support for non-traditional families, including grandparents who raise grandchildren, children facing the divorce of their parents, single parents, and families who do not fit traditional stereotypes.
Jean G. Stumpf Fund for the Aging
Established 1999More and more of the citizens of Middle Tennessee are living longer and consequently require more services. The Jean G. Stumpf Fund for the Aging has been created to help with the unique needs of this special segment of our society. The Fund provides a charitable vehicle to enhance the lifestyles of active seniors and to support those for whom remaining independent and in good health is a challenge.
Preston Taylor Boys & Girls Club/YMCA Center Permanent Endowment Fund
Established 2002Rather than build and operate separate facilities, Boys & Girls Clubs, the YMCA, MDHA and the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools created a national model of true partnership and located the Preston Taylor Boys & Girls Clubs/YMCA in the newly remodeled McKissack Middle School. The Center serves the Preston Taylor Homes area with programs for youth in grades 1-12. Programming includes education, sports, fine arts, leadership development, and wellness.
Tennessee Association of Sales Professionals Fund Benefiting the Girl Scouts
Established 1997The decision of the Tennessee Association of Sales Professionals (TASP) to grace the Girl Scouts with a Fund for its benefit is quite fitting. Not only are the members of the TASP all women who believe in service and responsibility, but there is no paragon of virtue in the annals of salesmanship that can equal the Girl Scout with her box of cookies. As the Girl Scouts continue to make a positive difference in the lives and futures of numerous young women, this Fund will endow the future of the organization it is designated to support.
Tennessee Breast Cancer Coalition Endowment Fund
Established 2000Rare is the family left unaffected by breast cancer. As long as it continues to endanger our friends and family, the Tennessee Breast Cancer Coalition will be there actively supporting community efforts to provide education, research and outreach. This Fund allows TBCC to continue serving Tennesseans living with breast cancer until this disease is eradicated.
Tennessee Breast Cancer Fund
Established 2000The Tennessee Breast Cancer Coalition actively supports community efforts for breast cancer education, research and outreach. The Tennessee Breast Cancer Fund was established to provide funding to organizations supporting individuals and families living with breast cancer, to keep research and advocacy in the eyes and ears of those who can implement change, and to assist grassroots organizations in efforts to educate us all.
Tennessee Conference on Social Welfare Endowment Fund
Established 1999Since its founding in 1913, the Tennessee Conference on Social Welfare
(TCSW) has provided advocacy and service to thousands of Tennesseans, especially lowincome
and vulnerable citizens. TCSW acts on behalf of 160 nonprofit agencies and
1,500 individual citizens to insure the availability, coordination, quality and effectiveness
in human services, from adoption to aging.
Tennessee Walking Horse Foundation Endowment Fund
Established 2002The Tennessee Walking Horse Foundation encourages support of charitable, scientific and educational projects for the welfare of the Tennessee Walking Horse. This Fund will assist in the support of such programs as Second Careers Adopt-a- Horse and Youth and Therapeutic Riding and Driving.
TKALS – Tennessee NARAL Fund for Women’s Reproductive Freedom
Established 1998To its founders, the key word in the name of this Fund is “freedom” — the freedom of a woman to choose to have a child, the freedom of a woman to remain childless. This Fund will be used to benefit a wide range of causes surrounding the issue of reproductive freedom.
United Neighborhood Health Services, Inc. Endowment Fund
Established 2008United Way of Metropolitan Nashville Endowment Fund
Established 2001United Way of Metropolitan Nashville invests in proven agency programs that show measurable and lasting results. The organization develops strategies to tackle the problems, investing dollars in programs to create a community where individuals, families and neighborhoods thrive. Donor gifts improve lives and also impact the community long-term by creating happy, healthy, informed people.
United Way of Rutherford County Endowment Fund
Established 1999The United Way of Rutherford County Endowment Fund offers venture grants to nonprofits and one-time grants for human and health care agencies in Rutherford and Cannon Counties. The Fund is intended to cover administrative costs of the United Way, so that all money given by donors will go to help those in need.
United Way of Williamson County Agency Endowment
Established 1998An autonomous, nonprofit organization, United Way of Williamson County touches the senior citizen living alone, the single mother struggling to make ends meet, or the child with disabilities whose parents need a helping hand. It helps the helpers who are there to offer that “hand up,” ensuring that our communities remain safe and healthy. This endowment is critical to the organization’s ability to continue to serve in the future.
Bill Weaver Designated Fund to Benefit Time to Rise
Established 2002Founded in 1992, Time to Rise gives at-risk students the chance to discover their potential and excel during structured summer and year-round academic programs. The program targets fifth and sixth grade boys and girls attending Metro Nashville public schools, living in impoverished conditions and demonstrating academic potential. These are students who could conceivably fall through the cracks without intervention.
Carolyn Smith Wendrich Fund for Victims
Established 1996Before her death, Carolyn Wendrich established a Fund at The Community Foundation to benefit programs serving victims of crime. She worried over stories about neighbors — whom she likened to playful, trusting otters — as she watched them make themselves vulnerable and saw them get preyed upon all too often. It was her hope that over time, this Fund would grow both in size and in its ability to show victimized members of our community that we care.
The Joni Werthan Fund to Erase the Stigma of Suicide
Established 2004Joni Werthan knows the trauma that suicide of a loved one brings. She has survived the shock and the pain, the guilt and the “what ifs.” She has also come to understand firsthand the enormous stigma such a loss leaves in its wake. This Fund will benefit the organizations that help people contemplating suicide and the survivors of loved ones who chose this path.
Lorene White Organ Transplantation Fund
Established 1997Lorene Sharp White passed away in 1983 after years of ill health because a suitable organ donor could not be found in time. During the course of Lorene’s illness, her family met others in need of life-saving organ transplants, and they saw firsthand the financial and emotional challenges that accompanied such illnesses. Lorene’s husband, Raymond, established Transplants, Inc. following her death to provide nonprofit financial assistance for medical costs to those in need of organ transplants. In 1997, the Board of Transplants, Inc. decided to assure the continuity of its work by establishing this Fund through which the message and encouragement of organ donation and transplantation could spread.
Workforce Readiness Fund
Established 2008As it concluded the provision of direct service to our community, the Dress for Success Nashville Board of Directors used the nonprofit’s remaining assets to create the Workforce Readiness Fund. This Fund will continue Dress For Success’ tradition of helping people prepare for economic self-sufficiency as they join or rejoin the workforce.
Mildred B. Zindler Fund for Children
Established 1994Mildred Zindler, a Winchester native, was a woman who simply wanted to give something back. To ensure that her spirit of charitable concern would continue after her passing, Mildred and her advisors turned to The Community Foundation to endow her generosity through this Fund. A bequest in her Will asks that the proceeds from this Fund be directed toward the care, shelter, education, and maintenance in health of needy children, guaranteeing that Mildred Zindler’s legacy of kindness would continue long after her death in 1994.
