Stephen V. Harkness - Philanthropy

Philanthropy

After Stephen's death, his second wife Anna M. Harkness established the Commonwealth Fund, a foundation dedicated to the improvement of healthcare. Under the guideance of their second son, Edward Harkness, the foundation made charitable gifts totaling more than $129 million, the equivalent of $2 billion in 2005 dollars. The fund was a major benefactor of the New York Public Library and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose initial art of Ancient Egypt collection was a gift from Edward Harkness.

Edward also established the Harkness Fellowships and the Pilgrim Trust in the UK in 1930 with an endowment of just over two million pounds, "prompted by his admiration for what Great Britain had done in the 1914-18 war and, by his ties of affection for the land from which he drew his descent." The current priorities of the trust are preservation, places of worship, and social welfare.

Other grants funded educational and medical needs such as: Harkness House, a student cooperative in Oberlin College; 'St Salvator's Hall at the University of St Andrews; Harkness Chapel at Connecticut College; Butler Library at Columbia University as well as the original portions of the Columbia University Medical Center (Mrs. Harkness, in memory of her husband, helped fund the hospital's Harkness Pavilion ). The undergraduate dormitories at Brown University, Harvard University, Yale University, and Connecticut College were built through Harkness philanthropy. At Yale, Harkness-donated buildings include the Memorial Quadrangle, Harkness Tower, William L. Harkness Hall. Edward Harkness also made the gifts that established the Yale School of Drama and erected its theatre.

Harkness funds went to several boarding schools, fostering introducing the revolutionary Harkness table method of instruction, starting with Phillips Exeter Academy, and spreading to St. Paul’s, The Lawrenceville School, and Kingswood-Oxford School in West Hartford, Conn. Harkness also gave to Taft School, Hill School and Phillips Academy.

Stephen's sons Charles and Edward also helped found and sustain The Third Society, later known as Wolf's Head Society, at Yale University in 1883 - their Yale Classes were William, 1881, Charles, 1883, and Edward, 1897. The Harkness family donated funds for the society's second hall, on York Street, New Haven, CT.

Harkness funded Henry Flagler's involvement with JD Rockefeller and Standard Oil, an investment that provided the seed money for Hagler's development of Florida's east coast.