The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a US$25,000 gift from Edsel Ford. By 1947, after the death of the two founders, the foundation owned 90% of the non-voting shares of the Ford Motor Company. Between 1955 and 1974, the foundation sold its Ford Motor Company holdings and now plays no role in the automobile company.
The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The second-oldest major philanthropic institution in America, after the Carnegie Corporation, the foundation was ranked as the 39th largest U.S. foundation by total giving as of 2015. By the end of 2016, assets were tallied at $4.1 billion, with annual grants of $173 million. According to the OECD, the foundation provided US$283.9 million for development in 2021. The foundation has given more than $14 billion in current dollars.
John Davison Rockefeller Jr. was an American financier and philanthropist. Rockefeller was the only son of Standard Oil co-founder John D. Rockefeller. He was involved in the development of the vast office complex in Midtown Manhattan known as Rockefeller Center, making him one of the largest real estate holders in the city. Towards the end of his life, he was famous for his philanthropy, donating over $500 million to a wide variety of different causes, including educational establishments. Among his projects was the reconstruction of Colonial Williamsburg in Virginia. He was widely blamed for having orchestrated the Ludlow Massacre and other offenses during the Colorado Coalfield War. Rockefeller was the father of six children: Abby, John III, Nelson, Laurance, Winthrop, and David.
John Davison Rockefeller III was an American philanthropist. Rockefeller was the eldest son and second child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller as well as a grandson of Standard Oil co-founder John D. Rockefeller. He was engaged in a wide range of philanthropic projects, many of which his family had launched, as well as supporting organizations related to East Asian affairs. Rockefeller was also a major supporter of the Population Council, and the committee that created the Lincoln Center in Manhattan.
The Rockefeller family is an American industrial, political, and banking family that owns one of the world's largest fortunes. The fortune was made in the American petroleum industry during the late 19th and early 20th centuries by brothers John D. Rockefeller and William A. Rockefeller Jr., primarily through Standard Oil. The family had a long association with, and control of, Chase Manhattan Bank. By 1977, the Rockefellers were considered one of the most powerful families in American history. The Rockefeller family originated in Rhineland in Germany and family members moved to the Americas in the early 18th century, while through Eliza Davison, with family roots in Middlesex County, New Jersey, John D. Rockefeller and William A. Rockefeller Jr. and their descendants are also of Scotch-Irish ancestry.
Laurance Spelman Rockefeller was an American businessman, financier, philanthropist, and conservationist. Rockefeller was the third son and fourth child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller. As a trustee of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, he provided venture capital for Intel, Apple Computer and many other successful start-ups. Rockefeller was known for his involvement in wilderness preservation, ecology and the protection of wildlife. His crusade was the establishing of a conservation ethic, and he was declared America's leading conservationist by Lady Bird Johnson.
David Rockefeller was an American investment banker who served as chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan Corporation. He was the oldest living member of the third generation of the Rockefeller family, and family patriarch from 2004 until his death in 2017. Rockefeller was the fifth son and youngest child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and a grandson of John D. Rockefeller and Laura Spelman Rockefeller.
Kykuit, known also as the John D. Rockefeller Estate, is a 40-room historic house museum in Pocantico Hills, a hamlet in the town of Mount Pleasant, New York 25 miles north of New York City. The house was built for oil tycoon and Rockefeller family patriarch John D. Rockefeller. Conceived largely by his son, John D. Rockefeller Jr., and enriched by the art collection of the third-generation scion, Governor of New York, and Vice President of the United States, Nelson Rockefeller, it was home to four generations of the family. The house is a National Historic Landmark owned by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and tours are given by Historic Hudson Valley.
Rockefeller is a German surname, originally given to people from the now-abandoned village of Rockenfeld near Neuwied in the Rhineland and commonly referring to subjects associated with the Rockefeller family. It may refer to:
Abigail Aldrich Rockefeller was an American philanthropist and the daughter of American financier John D. Rockefeller Jr. and a granddaughter of Standard Oil co-founder John D. Rockefeller.
Margaretta Large "Happy" Rockefeller was a philanthropist who, as the wife of vice president Nelson Rockefeller, served as second lady of the United States from 1974 to 1977. She was previously the first lady of New York from 1963 to 1973, during her husband's last three terms in office.
The Special Studies Project was a study funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and conceived by its then president, Nelson Rockefeller, to 'define the major problems and opportunities facing the U.S. and clarify national purposes and objectives, and to develop principles which could serve as the basis of future national policy'. The study ran between 1956 and 1960.
Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller, sometimes referred to by his nickname Rocky, was an American businessman and politician who served as the 41st vice president of the United States from 1974 to 1977 under President Gerald Ford. A member of the Republican Party and the wealthy Rockefeller family, he previously served as the 49th governor of New York from 1959 to 1973. Rockefeller also served as assistant secretary of State for American Republic Affairs for Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman (1944–1945) as well as under secretary of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) under Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1954. A son of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller as well as a grandson of Standard Oil co-founder John D. Rockefeller, he was a noted art collector and served as administrator of Rockefeller Center in Manhattan, New York City.
The Rockefeller Archive Center is an independently operated foundation that was initially established to serve as a repository for the records of Rockefeller University and various Rockefeller family philanthropy projects. Until 2008, it was a division of Rockefeller University.
Jane Wales is an American non-profit executive and former US government official who has served on the boards of directors of and founded many institutions. She is the Vice President of the Aspen Institute, and was the CEO of the World Affairs Council of Northern California for 20 years before resigning in 2019. She was also the founder and CEO of the Global Philanthropy Forum, She helped found the African Philanthropy Forum and the Brazilian Philanthropy Forum, and was the initial Executive Director of the Elders. Moreover, she advises many philanthropists, chairs the board of the non-profit consultancy FSG, and is a member of the board of the Center for a New American Security and OpenCorporates. She serves on the advisory boards of the Generosity Commission and the Stanley Foundation. Her articles have appeared in The Guardian, the Stanford Social Science Review, Aspen Ideas Magazine and other publications. She is frequently interviewed on national security and economic development issues on television and public radio.
Mary Billings French Rockefeller was an American heiress, socialite, philanthropist, and a member of the extensive Rockefeller family. She was married to Laurance Rockefeller, son of John Davison Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller. She was the mother of Laura Rockefeller Chasin, Marion Rockefeller Weber, Lucy Rockefeller Waletzky, and Laurance Spelman Rockefeller Jr.
Fossil fuel divestment or fossil fuel divestment and investment in climate solutions is an attempt to reduce climate change by exerting social, political, and economic pressure for the institutional divestment of assets including stocks, bonds, and other financial instruments connected to companies involved in extracting fossil fuels.
Since the 1970s, American fossil fuel and energy corporation ExxonMobil has engaged in climate research focussing on global warming. It later began lobbying, advertising, and grant making, some of which were conducted with the purpose of delaying widespread acceptance and action on global warming.
Stephen B. Heintz is an American nonprofit executive and public policy expert. Since 2001, he has served as president of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, a family foundation with an endowment of approximately $1.2 billion that advances social change for a more just, sustainable, and peaceful world. Heintz coined the term “acupuncture philanthropy” to describe his philanthropic approach of leveraging modest financial assets to trigger larger systemic change on critical issues.
David Walter Kaiser was an American philanthropist and president of the Rockefeller Family Fund, known for his environmental activism. He was a grandson of David Rockefeller, the great grandson of American financer John D. Rockefeller Jr. and great-great-grandson of Standard Oil founder John D. Rockefeller.
