· Private foundation
Earl C Sams Foundation Inc
Its FY2024 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
What you funded, over time
By grantee IRS cause code (NTEE).
A cause breakdown isn’t shown here: 65% of EARL C SAMS FOUNDATION INC’s grantee dollars fall outside its nine largest cause areas, whether because the recipient carries no IRS cause code or because its cause sits in the long tail. A chart would be mostly one residual band and misrepresent the portfolio.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k19 grants · $96k
- $10k–50k28 grants · $410k
- $50k–250k2 grants · $271k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| VALLEY ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY GLADYS PORTER ZOO | $170,500 |
| TEXAS STATE AQUARIUM | $100,000 |
| HILL COUNTRY DAILY BREAD MINISTRY | $40,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $23,800 |
| FRIENDS OF THE PORT O'CONNOR LIBRARY | $20,000 |
| AGAPE RANCH | $20,000 |
| WARRIOR'S WEEKEND | $20,000 |
| COASTAL BEND COMMUNITY FUND | $20,000 |
| 1 HOPE FOR KIDS | $20,000 |
| TIMONS MINISTRIES | $15,000 |
| FOSTER ANGELS OF SOUTH TEXAS FOUNDATION | $15,000 |
| FRYDERYK CHOPIN SOCIETY OF TEXAS | $15,000 |
| CORPUS CHRISTI PREGNANCY CENTER | $15,000 |
| MISSION OF MERCY INC | $15,000 |
| CORPUS CHRISTI METRO MINISTRIES | $15,000 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Your human-services grants (FY20–24, $313k) land where the poverty rate runs at 17%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 97% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +42% since the first grant, against +1% for the ones you funded once.
53 repeat relationships — 32 still active in FY2024, 21 since wound down; 17 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Median revenue growth · since first grant
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 82% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $142k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as “new.” Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.
Backed again, and grew
- DCDriscoll Children's Hospital Development Foundation3× · 2020–2022 · $200k · revenue +455%
- CCCORPUS CHRISTI PREGNANCY CENTER INC4× · 2020–2024 · $67k · revenue +70%
- FCFRYDERYK CHOPIN SOCIETY OF TEXAS INC4× · 2020–2024 · $57k · revenue +42% · 27% of their budget
Funded once
THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS FOUNDATION INCgraduatedone grant, 2022 · $100k · revenue +44%- VZVALLEY ZOOLOGICAL ENDOWMENTone grant, 2020 · $60k · revenue -5%
- UTUNIV TX RIO GRANDE VALLEY FOUNDATIONone grant, 2022 · $40k
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
Wildlife rescue of central texas cares for injured and orphaned wildlife, provides public education programs, and promotes peaceful coexistence with our wild neighbors.
To provide family services and to provide residential child care for dependent children where there is a need to assist children and families disrupted by problems.
Provide veterinary and shelter services for displaced and wayward animals in the township and outlying area of port aransas, texas.
The texas state aquarium's mission is engaging people with animals, inspiring appreciation for our seas, and supporting wildlife conservation. its vision is to be a global leader in fostering support for the conservation of the gulf of…
To support coastal conservation association in carrying out the charitable and educational purpose for which it was organized and is operated, namely, promoting and advancing the preservation, conservation and protection of marine, plant…
Provide support to foster children and at risk families in Comal County Texas. Provide emergency support to victims of child abuse.
The organization is dedicated to rescuing, rehabilitating and releasing orphaned and injured wildlife in the texas panhandle.
To strengthen the lives of children and families.
Rescue neglected, unwanted homeless dogs and cats nurture and provide shelter until they are placed with a forever family strive to reduce animal overpopulation prevent cruelty to animals teach responsible pet ownership through an outreach…
Charitable and educational purposes for homeless in-school youth and their families. to provide a safe place and nurturing environment to unaccompanied homeless youth and their families in order to attain success with academic, social and…
Texas Christian Foundations mission is to mobilize resources by inspiring biblical generosity and educating Texans on ways their generosity can impact their community, Texas and the world.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Big Brothers Big Sisters of South Texas Inc and the most unlike its peers is Sabinal Alumni. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 28 years old; the field is 13. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 26% startups (under 5 years old) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 3% lost their exemption, against 14% of the field you don’t fund.
Age = years since IRS exemption (a founding proxy). “Closed” = auto-revocation for 3 years of non-filing — a floor on closure, not proof, and bigger established orgs lapse least. Association, not causation.
72 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 72 of the 117 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds Driscoll Children's Hospital Development Foundation ↗
- Who funds THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds WARRIORS WEEKEND ↗
- Who funds CORPUS CHRISTI PREGNANCY CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds CORPUS CHRISTI METRO MINISTRIESINC ↗
- Who funds VALLEY ZOOLOGICAL ENDOWMENT ↗
- Who funds FRYDERYK CHOPIN SOCIETY OF TEXAS INC ↗
- Who funds MISSION OF MERCY INC ↗
- Who funds TIMON'S MINISTRIES ↗
- Who funds 1HOPE FOR KIDS INC ↗
- Who funds NEW LIFE REFUGE MINISTRIES ↗
- Who funds AGAPE RANCH ↗
- Who funds MESSIAH MINISTRIES INC ↗
- Who funds CORPUS CHRISTI LITERACY COUNCIL ↗
- Who funds Port OConnor Chamber of Commerce ↗
- Who funds CORPUS CHRISTI HOPE HOUSE INC ↗
- Who funds CAMILLE PLAYERS INC ↗
- Who funds SOUTH TEXAS LIGHTHOUSE FOR THE BLIND ↗
- Who funds CHARITY LEAGUE OF CORPUS CHRISTI ↗
- Who funds SOUTH TEXAS BOTANICAL GARDENS ↗
- Who funds VETERANS ASSISTANCE DOGS OF TEXAS INC ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF THE PORT O CONNOR LIBRARY INC ↗
- Who funds SEA TURTLE INC ↗
- Who funds BROWNSVILLE SOCIETY FOR CRIPPLED CHILDREN INCORPORATED ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Ed Rachal Foundation · Behmann Brothers Foundation · Coastal Bend Community Foundation · Allen Lovelace Moore and Blanche Davis Moore Foundation · The John G and Marie Stella Kenedy Memorial Foundation · United Way of the Coastal Bend Inc · Laverne & Thomas Howell Foundation · Frazier Family Foundation Inc · Alice Kleberg Reynolds Meyer Foundat A0479800 · Puente de Maravillas Foundation · Susser Family Foundation · The Moody Foundation
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Earl C Sams Foundation Inc funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending — grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12–24 months.