· Private foundation
Lester & Frances Johnson Foundation Inc
Its FY2024 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k14 grants · $62k
- $10k–50k10 grants · $165k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $60k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| THE RIVER FOOD PANTRY | $60,000 |
| TIMOTHY'S MINISTRY | $40,000 |
| GLEN-ED PANTRY | $20,000 |
| EASTERN ILLINOIS FOOD BANK | $15,000 |
| HEALTH BY ALL MEANS | $15,000 |
| MUNCIE CRIME STOPPERS | $15,000 |
| COURAGE CONNECTION | $15,000 |
| TENTH LIFE CAT RESCUE | $15,000 |
| WAYFORWARD FOOD PANTRY | $10,000 |
| GIO'S GARDEN | $10,000 |
| FOSTER & ADOPTIVE CARE COALITION | $10,000 |
| EVANSTON ANIMAL SHELTER | $8,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $5,000 |
| ASPCA | $5,000 |
| ANIMAL RESCUE CORPS | $5,000 |
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 (FY17–24, $696k) land where the poverty rate runs at 8%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 29% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Your grants skew toward lower-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.
Which US states your grants reach
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.
33 repeat relationships — 15 still active in FY2024, 18 since wound down; 9 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, 77% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $65k 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
- TRTHE RIVER FOOD PANTRY INC8× · 2017–2024 · $660k · revenue +153%
- TMTIMOTHY'S MINISTRY8× · 2017–2024 · $290k · revenue +30%
- LFLOAVES & FISHES COMMUNITY SERVICES2× · 2020–2021 · $175k · revenue +124%
Funded once
- FRFRAXA Research Foundation Incone grant, 2018 · $25k · revenue +24%
- SOSUPPORT OUR TROOPS - ILLINOISone grant, 2017 · $20k
- SLSAINT LOUIS AREA FOOD PANTRYone grant, 2020 · $15k
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.
The food bank for central & northeast missouri is a regional disaster and hunger relief network that acquires and distributes millions of meals each year to help neighbors get the food they need to thrive. (continued on schedule o)the…
With the support of our community, we provide over 90 million meals annually through our network of over 900 member food pantries and programs across thirteen counties, currently reaching over a half million individuals each month with…
The friends are dedicated to the rescue, protection, and adoption of companion animals in need while inspiring the human-animal bond. we meet our mission by:-saving 100% of healthy and treatable animals.-providing high-quality animal care…
Feeding illinois is a coalition of eight feeding america food banks that provide food to over 2,400 food pantries, soup kitchens, and shelters that feed nearly 1.4 million residents across the entire state of illinois.
Operation of an animal shelter for unwanted and abandoned animals, community education to encourage humane treatment and responsible ownership.
Established in 2016, rescue pack serves communities across the midwest to tackle pet food insecurity by recovering donated surplus pet food and supplies and redistributing them through charitable programs. we partner with animal welfare…
On a mission to connect every person facing hunger with nutritious meals by maximizing food rescue. through direct service and community partnerships, feeding san diego provides more than 26 million meals each year to children, families,…
United Food Bank unites communities to alleviate hunger.
Reduce the euthanasia rate of healthy and adoptable animals and improve the lives of companion animals by finding permanent homes for animals in need, providing support to communities who do not have access to humane organizations,…
Retrieve a golden of the midwest (ragom) rescues, fosters, and rehomes golden retrievers and golden mixes that can no longer remain in their current environments. the organization ensures each dog receives necessary veterinary care and…
Recognizing the many benefits of the human animal bond, neighborhood pets (np) supports people with financial needs by helping them keep their pets in their homes. we do this by providing access to affordable pet care, resources, and other…
The mission of the Wisconsin Humane Society is to make a difference for animals and the people who love them.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Loaves & Fishes Community Services and the most unlike its peers is Agape Ranch Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
For each theme you fund, this compares how the sector’s money is shifting with how your own giving is shifting.
Sector change and giving change are each shown relative to their own range, growing (right) or shrinking (left); both normalized, so inflation isn’t mistaken for growth.
Your grantees are a median of 33 years old; the field is 20. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 17% startups (under 5 years old) — 3% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 8% 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.
35 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. 35 of the 66 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 THE RIVER FOOD PANTRY INC ↗
- Who funds TIMOTHY'S MINISTRY ↗
- Who funds LOAVES & FISHES COMMUNITY SERVICES ↗
- Who funds SECOND HARVEST FOODBANK OF SOUTHERN WI ↗
- Who funds EASTERN ILLINOIS FOODBANK ↗
- Who funds THE GLEN-ED PANTRY ↗
- Who funds SHARING CONNECTIONS INC ↗
- Who funds GATEWAY PET GUARDIANS ↗
- Who funds COURAGE CONNECTION ↗
- Who funds GIO'S GARDEN INC ↗
- Who funds ST LOUIS AREA FOOD BANK INC ↗
- Who funds THREE FIRES COUNCIL INC BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA #127 ↗
- Who funds WAYFORWARD RESOURCES INC ↗
- Who funds THE UW-PLATTEVILLE FOUNDATION AND ALUMNI ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds FRAXA Research Foundation Inc ↗
- Who funds TENTH LIFE CAT RESCUE ↗
- Who funds CHAMPAIGN COUNTY HUMANE SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds Animal Rescue Corps Inc ↗
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: Edward Jones Foundation · Jx Gives Back Family Foundation Inc · Madison Gas and Electric Foundation Inc · World Wide Technology Foundation · United Way of Greater St Louis Inc · The Blackbaud Giving Fund · Green Bay Packers Foundation · Alliant Energy Foundation Inc · Enterprise Holdings Foundation · Madison Community Foundation · St Louis Community Foundation Inc · The Pfizer Foundation Inc
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 Lester & Frances Johnson 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.
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Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.