The year was 1913. The United States, as a nation, was 137 years old. Woodrow Wilson was inaugurated as the 28th President. The 16th Amendment was passed, creating the federal income tax. Richard Nixon was born. Willa Cather published O Pioneers! and John Singer Sargent painted Portrait of Henry James. Vitamin A was first isolated and Niels Bohr formulated his theory of atomic structure. J. Pierpont Morgan died, Grand Central Station opened, the Philadelphia Athletics beat the New York Giants in the World Series, and World War I was imminent.

And in 1913 the work of the Rockefeller Foundation began.

In the years since, scientists and scholars worked to solve many of the world’s and the country’s ills. Plagues such as hookworm and malaria have been brought under control; food production for the hungry in many parts of the world has been increased; and the mind, heart, and spirit have been lifted by the work of Foundation-assisted artists, writers, dancers and composers.

The work of the
Foundation should
‘go to the root of
individual or social
ill-being and misery.’

But other challenges remain. The tasks of today are as vital and daunting as they were when John Davison Rockefeller’s foundation formally came into being.

His bent for philanthropy began early in life. In his teens, from sums earned in his first job, he allotted money for his Sunday school and other activities of his Baptist church. By 1860 Rockefeller’s philanthropy included regular contributions to churches, Sunday schools, and an orphanage.

As his personal wealth grew, Rockefeller’s interest in philanthropy increased. He was impressed in 1889 by an essay written by Andrew Carnegie and entitled The Gospel of Wealth. “The day is not far distant,” Carnegie said, “when the man who dies leaving behind him millions of available wealth, which was free for him to administer during life, will pass away unwept, unhonored, and unsung.”

Rockefeller wrote a letter to Carnegie: “I would that more men of wealth were doing as you are doing with your money but, be assured, your example will bear fruits and the time will come when men of wealth will more generally be willing to use it for the good of others.” In the same year—1889—Rockefeller began his philanthropic work in earnest, making the first of what would become $35 million in gifts, over a period of two decades, to found the University of Chicago. In 1901 he established the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, now Rockefeller University. In 1903 he created the General Education Board at an ultimate cost of $129 million to promote education in the United States “without distinction of sex, race, or creed.”

In 1909 he established the Rockefeller Sanitary Commission for Eradication of Hook-worm Disease to cure and prevent the disease, particularly in the southern United States. Rockefeller was prepared to begin the Rockefeller Foundation in 1909, even signing a deed of trust to turn over 72,569 shares of Standard Oil of New Jersey stock worth $50 million. But difficulties in seeking a federal charter for the Foundation, desired by Rockefeller though never obtained, resulted in a delay until 1913, when the Foundation was officially incorporated in the state of New York. Since its inception, the Rockefeller Foundation has given more than $14 billion in current dollars to thousands of grantees worldwide. In the chronology that follows, we highlight the work that the Rockefeller Foundation has brought to life.