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Plinth

· Private foundation

Polly Thayer Starr Charitable Trust Hemenway & Barnes LLP

Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.

$356k
Granted FY2025still arriving
4
Grants FY2025still arriving
2
States reached
$110k
Largest
01What you fund
01

What you funded, over time

By grantee IRS cause code (NTEE).

A cause breakdown isn’t shown here: 60% of POLLY THAYER STARR CHARITABLE TRUST HEMENWAY & BARNES LLP’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.

02FY2025 · 4 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2025

  • $10k–50k1 grant · $46k
  • $50k–250k3 grants · $310k
$100,000
Median grant
2
States reached
$5.7M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
Individual grant recipient$110,000
NORWELL VISITING NURSE ASSOCIATION AND HOSPICE$100,000
ISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM$100,000
NEW BRITAIN MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART INC$46,250
02The need
03

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.

show:

Your human-services grants (FY21–21, $570) land where the poverty rate runs at 8%, against an area that typically sits at 8%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 8%MYSTIC VALLEY ELDER SERVICES: $570 → 8%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

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.

03Your edge
repeat funding

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.

99%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$2.7M · 10 repeat orgs$16k to everyone else

10 repeat relationships — 4 still active in FY2025, 6 since wound down.

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

10
3

Total granted

$2.7M
$16k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+36%
+97%

Still filing today

60%
67%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 100% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $0 went to new ones.

50%100%’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
Arts & CultureEnvironmentHousing & ShelterHuman ServicesOther

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

  • ISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM INC
    8× · 2017–2025 · $768k · revenue +117%
  • NV
    Norwell Visiting Nurse Association Inc
    2× · 2017–2018 · $183k · revenue +80%
  • THE TRUSTEES OF RESERVATIONS
    3× · 2019–2021 · $150k · revenue +36%

Funded once

  • HALEY HOUSE INC & AFFILIATESgraduated
    one grant, 2021 · $8k · revenue +97%
  • SO
    SCHOOL OF THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS AT TUFTS UNIVERSITY
    one grant, 2019 · $8k
  • MV
    MYSTIC VALLEY AGING SERVICES INCgraduated
    one grant, 2021 · $570 · revenue +68%

Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Your field

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.

1
Boston Architectural College

The bac is committed to provide excellence in design education grounded in practice and accessible to diverse communities.

2
New England Museum Association

New england museum association's mission is to connect a community engaged in learning, collaboration, and action to cultivate a better museum world.

3
Trustees of the Berkshire Museum

Bringing people together for experiences that spark creativity and innovative thinking by making inspiring educational connections among art, history, and natural science.

Arts & Culture
4
Boston Society of Architects

The boston society of architects (bsa/aia) exists to improve the quality of life for boston-area residents by championing innovation in the built environment. as a membership association, we achieve this mission in partnership with the bsa…

5
Massachusetts Health & Hospital Assoc Inc

To advance the health of individuals and communities by serving as the leading voice for all massachusetts hospitals and healthcare systems and to help them provide high quality, cost-effective and equitable patient care.

6
Bartlett Arboretum Association Inc

To cultivate and develop an expansive collection of trees, gardens, and plants for all to explore, enjoy and study; and to provide through education and stewardship, a greener, healthier, more beautiful environment.

Environment
7
Mass General Brigham Health Plan Inc

Mass general brigham health plan's mission is to promote the health and wellness of our members, and to help ensure equitable, affordbale health care for the diverse communities we serve.

Health
8
Native Plant Trust Inc

The organization's mission is to conserve and promote new england's native plants to ensure healthy, biologically diverse landscapes.

Environment
9
Metropolitan Waterworks Museum Inc

The mwm owns and operates the waterworks museum (the "museum"), including a community meeting room. the museum is a single condominium unit of the museum building condominium, one of separate condominium building regimes on the site. the…

Arts & Culture
10
National Academy of Design

The mission of the national academy of design is to promote the fine arts in america through exhibition and education.

Education
11
New York Botanical Garden

The new york botanical garden is a museum of plants and a scientific research center devoted to the study of plants and their uses. it is the garden's mission to improve public understanding of the natural world, horticulture, and the…

Environment
12
Nantucket Historical Association

The nantucket historical association preserves and interprets the history of nantucket through its programs, collections, and properties, in order to promote the island's significance and foster an appreciation of it among all audiences.

Arts & Culture

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Mystic Valley Aging Services Inc and the most unlike its peers is Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

04the grantee network

8 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 20172025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 8 of the 13 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
1
Early backer (in before they grew)
8/8
Grantees still filing
8/8
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

NORWELL VISITING NURSE ASSOCIATION AND HOSPICE — $666,666 · OtherNORWELL VISITING NURSE ASSOCIATION AND HOSPICEIndividual grant recipient — $610,635 · OtherIndividual grant recipientNorwell Visiting Nurse Association Inc — $183,334 · OtherNorwell Visiting Nurse Association IncTRUSTEES OF TUFTS COLLEGE FBO SCHOOL OF THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS AT TUFTS — $65,000 · OtherBENEVOLENT FRATERNITY OF UNITARIAN CHURCHES — $55,000 · Other+2 more — $45,000 · OtherISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM INC — $767,500 · Arts & CultureISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM INCBOSTON ARTS ACADEMY FOUNDATION INC — $80,000 · Arts & CultureBOSTON ARTS ACADEMY FOUNDATION INCNEW BRITAIN MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART INC — $66,250 · Arts & CultureNEW BRITAIN MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART INCTHE TRUSTEES OF RESERVATIONS — $150,000 · EnvironmentHALEY HOUSE INC & AFFILIATES — $8,250 · Housing & ShelterMYSTIC VALLEY AGING SERVICES INC — $570 · Human Services
Other$1,625,635Arts & Culture$913,750Environment$150,000Housing & Shelter$8,250Human Services$570

Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM INC — $767,500 over 8y, 0.7% of budgetNorwell Visiting Nurse Association Inc — $183,334 over 2y, 0.4% of budgetTHE TRUSTEES OF RESERVATIONS — $150,000 over 3y, 0.2% of budgetBOSTON ARTS ACADEMY FOUNDATION INC — $80,000 over 2y, 0.8% of budgetNEW BRITAIN MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART INC — $66,250 over 2y, 0.8% of budgetBENEVOLENT FRATERNITY OF UNITARIAN CHURCHES — $55,000 over 2y, 1.4% of budgetHALEY HOUSE INC & AFFILIATES — $8,250 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetMYSTIC VALLEY AGING SERVICES INC — $570 over 1y, 0.0% of budget
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 ISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM INC
  • Who funds Norwell Visiting Nurse Association Inc
  • Who funds THE TRUSTEES OF RESERVATIONS
  • Who funds BOSTON ARTS ACADEMY FOUNDATION INC
  • Who funds NEW BRITAIN MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART INC
  • Who funds BENEVOLENT FRATERNITY OF UNITARIAN CHURCHES
  • Who funds HALEY HOUSE INC & AFFILIATES
  • Who funds MYSTIC VALLEY AGING SERVICES 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.

Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift FundMA6× affinity4 shared granteesties to 1 of 1Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile 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 Polly Thayer Starr Charitable Trust Hemenway & Barnes LLP 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, a single department, or state — and drag the year to watch it move.

2024
202122232425
no gov · 30%0%1%3%5%your share of their income ↑0%4%8%11%15%share of the org’s income from governmentmedian 2%
  • New Britain Museum of American Art Inc7% of income from government
  • The Trustees of Reservations2% of income from government
  • Boston Arts Academy Foundation Inc0% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
3get no government money at all
2report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–15%
typical government reliance, FY2025

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.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Polly Thayer Starr Charitable Trust Hemenway & Barnes LLP?

Find your warmest path to Polly Thayer Starr Charitable Trust Hemenway & Barnes LLP through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.

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.

On method. Every financial figure here is read directly from IRS e-file XML — your own 990/990-PF and the multi-year returns of the 13 grantees we resolved across every year we hold, several hundred filings in all (a different count from the grant rows on the cover, which are one fiscal year)— each linked to its source. Grantee achievements and outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III); we read these as association with sustained funding — the foundation is one of several forces — suppress low-confidence name matches rather than guess, and say so where a figure rests on a single grant or filing. Not everything on this page is a filed figure, and the difference matters. Filed is what you reported on your return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears. How we build these →

Generated from your IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

More from the funding graph