Salvation Army in USA to receive $1.5 billion gift
Howard Lake | 21 January 2004 | News
The bequest from Joan Kroc of at least $1.5 billion is one of the largest charitable donations from an individual to a non-profit.
Joan Kroc, who died in October 2003, was the widow of the founder of hamburger giant McDonald’s. She has also left money to other non-profits, but the gift to the Salvation Army is by far the largest.
The final amount of the bequest will only be known when the estate’s administration is complete.
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Mrs Kroc specified that half the donation is spent on building community centres, and the other half placed in an endowment to contribute to their operating costs. She did not want any of the gift spent on other projects or administration costs. She also made it clear that the communities selected for these new centres would need to provide additional support for operational purposes.
Only a few other people have exceeded this donation, notably Bill and Melinda Gates’ $5 billion gift of Microsoft stock to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000, and Ted Turner’s 1997 pledge to give $1 billion to the United Nations.
The Salvation Army has not surprisingly featured Mrs Kroc’s donation on its front page, together with a video and audio version of the non-profit’s announcement of the donation.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.