MacArthur Foundation

John D. MacArthur owned Bankers Life and Casualty and other businesses, as well as considerable property holdings in Florida and New York. His wife, Catherine, held positions in many of these companies. Their attorney, William T. Kirby, and Paul Doolen, their chief financial officer, suggested that the family create a foundation to be endowed by their vast fortune.

When MacArthur died on January 6, 1978, he was worth in excess of a billion dollars. He left 92 percent of his estate to found the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Its first board of directors, per MacArthur's will, also included J. Roderick MacArthur, John's son from his first marriage, two other officers of Bankers Life and Casualty, and radio commentator Paul Harvey.[1] Jonas Salk, the inventor of the polio vaccine, later joined the board of directors.[15]

The elder MacArthur believed in the free market.[16][17] However, he did not direct how foundation money was to be spent after he died. MacArthur told the board of directors, "I figured out how to make the money. You fellows will have to figure out how to spend it."[18]

Between 1979 and 1981, John's son, an ideological opponent of his father with whom the elder MacArthur had an acrimonious relationship, waged a legal battle against the foundation for control of the board of directors.[19] The younger MacArthur sued eight members of the board, accusing them of mismanagement of the foundation funds. These court cases were dismissed by each jurisdiction for lack of merit.

In 1984, MacArthur again sued the board of directors including William Kirby, his father's trusted attorney, asking a Cook County circuit court to liquidate the entire MacArthur Foundation. He dropped the suit later that same year when he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.[20][21]

John E. Corbally, the first president of the foundation and later board chairman from 1995 to 2002, was followed in 1989–99 by Adele Simmons, who was the first female dean at Princeton University.[22][23] Jonathan Fanton, president of American Academy of Arts and Sciences, served as the foundation's next president.[22][24] Robert Gallucci, formerly dean of Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, served as the foundation's fourth president from 2009 to 2014.[22][25] Gallucci was fired in 2014.[26] Julia Stasch, who formerly served as MacArthur's vice president for U.S. Programs, was named the foundation's president in 2015.[1] Stasch had been chief of staff to Chicago mayor Richard M. Daley.[27] She announced that she would step down in 2019.[28] In March 2019, John Palfrey was named president, effective September 1, 2019.[29]

The MacArthur Fellowship is an award issued by the MacArthur Foundation each year, to typically 20 to 30 citizens or residents of the United States, of any age and working in any field, who "show exceptional merit and promise for continued and enhanced creative work". The program was initiated in 1981.[30] According to the foundation, the fellowship is not a reward for past accomplishment, but an investment in a person's originality and potential. As of 2015, MacArthur Fellows receive $625,000 each, which is paid out in quarterly installments over five years.[31] The Chicago Foundation for Women was one of the nonprofit organizations to receive a US$1 million four-year grant in 2017.[32] No one can apply for the program, and, generally, no one knows whether they are being considered as a candidate. Nominators, serving confidentially, anonymously and for a limited time, are invited to recommend potential Fellows. Candidates are reviewed by a selection committee whose members also serve confidentially, anonymously and for a limited time. Ultimately, the selection committee makes recommendations to the foundation's board of directors for final approval.[13]

• List of wealthiest charitable foundations

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