· Private foundation
Mary C & Perry F Spencer Fdn
Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k6 grants · $31k
- $10k–50k12 grants · $216k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| HARLAN CHRISTIAN YOUTH CENTER | $40,000 |
| NEW MERCIES MINISTRIES | $35,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $20,000 |
| SOULMEDIC MEDIA GROUP INC | $20,000 |
| ASSOCIATED CHURCHES OF FT WAYNE IND | $16,000 |
| CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY HEALTH CARE INC | $15,000 |
| ALLEN COUNTY FT WAYNE HISTORICAL SO | $15,000 |
| YOUTH FOR CHRIST USA INC | $15,000 |
| CANCER SERVICES OF NE INDIANA | $10,000 |
| WOODBURN CHRISTIAN CHILDRENS HOME | $10,000 |
| FORT WAYNE PUBLIC TELEVISION | $10,000 |
| POWER HOUSE YOUTH CENTER | $10,000 |
| HEARCARE CONNECTION INC | $7,800 |
| DRIVE ALIVE INC | $7,500 |
| TIMEVISTA THEATER INC | $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 (FY17–25, $416k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 11% 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.
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 +54% since the first grant, against +0% for the ones you funded once.
34 repeat relationships — 15 still active in FY2025, 19 since wound down; 3 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (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 FY2025, 87% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $33k 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
- HCHARLAN CHRISTIAN YOUTH CENTER INC9× · 2017–2025 · $324k · revenue +41%
- WCWOODBURN CHRISTIAN CHILDRENS HOME INC8× · 2017–2025 · $155k · revenue +147%
- SMSOULMEDIC MEDIA GROUP INC8× · 2017–2025 · $128k · revenue +329%
Funded once
- SRSCHERER RESOURCES INCone grant, 2018 · $30k
- BHBoth Hands Foundationgraduatedone grant, 2018 · $15k · revenue +179%
- FWFT WAYNE PARKS & RECREATIONone grant, 2017 · $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.
Improving the health status of the community at large with special emphasis on those who, because of their poverty, location in rural areas, or for other reasons, have health needs which are not being properly addressed.
Conduct annual agriculture fair and other fairs, expos, exhibits, etc. related to agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry, and home econcomics, etc.
Provide assistance for the needy by giving away essential items such as food, blankets, clothing, etc.
Our mission is to honor and obey god by providing hope and healing to children and families, who may then bless others. the residential, foster care, adoption and other programs served nearly 500 individuals during the year.
The mission of the fort wayne youtheatre is to educate, engage, and entertain area youth and families through theatre arts. founded by mrs. chan ray and mrs. lester jacobs in 1934 as part of old fort players (now the civic theatre), the…
To serve homeless families by uniting faith community volunteers and local agencies in a cooperative effort to provide shelter, meals and compassionate ongoing support to our guests.
Our mission is to provide professional counseling with the highest level of ethical standards to individuals in the community . We believe in health, healing, hope, growth, recovery and transformation as foundational goals for everyone and…
Marion general hospital exists to transform the health of our community through patient-centered, high quality, affordable care. best practices by leading a collaborative approach involving physicians, staff, business leaders and our…
Charitable distribution of clothing, food and household items.
To educate, promote vaccination and increase avenues for immunizations for all children and adults in Allen County and surrounding communities.
Lutheran homes society, inc. is a not-for-profit corporation that provides residential care and supportive services for youth and elderly in northwestern ohio and southeastern michigan. as a faith-based provider of such services, lutheran…
To showcase local talent and provide the area with high quality entertainment.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Cancer Services of Allen County Inc and the most unlike its peers is East Allen County Schools Educational Foundation Inc. 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 30 years old; the field is 19. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 21% startups (under 5 years old) — 13% of your grantees by number, and just 4% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 3% lost their exemption, against 10% 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.
31 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. 31 of the 55 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 HARLAN CHRISTIAN YOUTH CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds WOODBURN CHRISTIAN CHILDRENS HOME INC ↗
- Who funds SOULMEDIC MEDIA GROUP INC ↗
- Who funds NEW MERCIES MINISTRIES INC ↗
- Who funds Allen County-Fort Wayne Historical Society Inc ↗
- Who funds The Power House Alliance Inc ↗
- Who funds YOUTH FOR CHRIST OF NORTHERN INDIANA INC ↗
- Who funds CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY HEALTH CARE INC ↗
- Who funds HEARCARE CONNECTION INC ↗
- Who funds SAFE FAMILIES FOR CHILDREN ALLIANCE ↗
- Who funds WELLSPRING INTERFAITH SOCIAL SERVICES INC ↗
- Who funds CANCER SERVICES OF ALLEN COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds ALL FOR ONE PRODUCTIONS INC ↗
- Who funds Heart of the City Mission Foundation ↗
- Who funds LEAGUE FOR THE BLIND AND DISABLED INC ↗
- Who funds MY NEXT STEP INC ↗
- Who funds ANTWERP COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE INC ↗
- Who funds MATTHEW 25 INC ↗
- Who funds ECKSTEIN WORKSHOP AND ACTIVITIES INC ↗
- Who funds Both Hands Foundation ↗
- Who funds FORT WAYNE PUBLIC TELEVISION INC ↗
- Who funds HUMANE FORT WAYNE INC ↗
- Who funds CASS HOUSING 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: Community Foundation of Greater Fort Wayne Inc · English-Bonter-Mitchell Fdn · Edward M Wilson Foundation · Dr Louis a and Anne B Schneider Fdn · M E Raker Foundation Inc · The Waterfield Foundation Inc · McMillen Foundation Inc · Howard P Arnold Foundation Inc · Surack Family Foundation Inc · The James Foundation Inc · Mary Cross Tippmann Foundation · Parkview Health System 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 Mary C & Perry F Spencer Fdn 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.
- American Welding Society Inc — 0% of income from government
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.