· Private foundation
Sam Family Foundation
Read this first · the figures below need context
100% of Sam Family Foundation’s FY2023 grant dollars went to Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund, not to grantees.
Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2023 names 0 organizations directly, so a portfolio cannot be read from it. Everything below is therefore FY2020, the last year Sam Family Foundation named its own grantees at scale: 5 organizations, $45k. It is dated, not current.
Organizations named directly on the return
Amber years are those where most dollars went to a sponsor.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2023.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2020
- Under $10k6 grants · $15k
- $10k–50k2 grants · $30k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| JUPITER MEDICAL FOUNDATION | $20,000 |
| LOST TREE VILLAGE CHARITABLE FOUNDATION | $10,000 |
| The Pat Green Foundation | $6,250 |
| Children's Home & Aid | $5,000 |
| ST PAUL OF THE CROSS | $1,000 |
| MADONNA MISSION | $1,000 |
| LOST TREE CHAPEL | $1,000 |
| The Pink Foundation | $500 |
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 (FY17–22, $29k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 56% 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 +44% since the first grant, against +41% for the ones you funded once.
10 repeat relationships — 8 still active in FY2020, 2 since wound down; 3 grantees were first funded in FY2020 (too recent to call). Read against FY2020, the last year this funder named its own grantees directly; its giving has since run through a sponsor, which reports no donor behind each grant.
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 FY2022, 100% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $0 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
- LTLost Tree Village Charitable Foundation5× · 2017–2021 · $48k · revenue +38%
- TPTHE PAT GREEN FOUNDATION2× · 2020–2022 · $13k · revenue +725%
- CHCHILDREN'S HOME & AID SOCIETY OF ILL2× · 2017–2020 · $10k · revenue +41%
Funded once
Northwestern Universitygraduatedone grant, 2019 · $15k · revenue +34%- JMJUPITER MED CENTER FOUNDATIONone grant, 2017 · $10k
- ESEVANS SCHOLARS FOUNDATIONone grant, 2017 · $10k
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 GI Research Foundation works to treat, prevent, and cure digestive diseases. In collaboration with the physicians and scientists at the University of Chicago Digestive Diseases Center, we fund innovative clinical and laboratory…
Stanley manne children's research institute strives to generate new knowledge and advance the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of pediatric diseases.
We value excellence and innovation in clinical and basic research, coordinated and comprehensive patient care, ongoing physician education, and evidence-based child advocacy. our goal is to provide leadership in endeavors that promote the…
The mission of mit is to advance knowledge and educate students in science, technology, and other areas of scholarship that will best serve the nation and the world in the 21st century.
The Foundation, a 501(c)(3) charitable organization, is an independent and separate nonprofit entity from the University of Illinois. Our mission is to encourage and administer private gifts and serve the UI System by working closely with…
Provider of pediatric healthcare, education, research & community service
The mission of MIAMI CHILDREN'S HEALTH SYSTEM FOUNDATION (D/B/A NICKLAUS CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL FOUNDATION, INC. )is to create awareness and generate funds for Nicklaus Children's Health System (System), Nicklaus Children's Hospital and any…
We are dedicated to the health and well-being of all children. as the pediatric teaching facility for the northwestern university feinberg school of medicine, this commitment drives us to be a leader in: -pediatric health care delivery…
The NCHRI directly supports the NICKLAUS CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL ("NCH") mission to provide hope through advanced care for our children and families. (CONTINUED ON SCHEDULE O)
Provide pediatric and subspecialty surgical, research, and educational services.
To optimize philanthropy in support of the mission and future of the children's hospital of chicago medical center.
Ann & robert h. lurie children's hospital of chicago is dedicated to the health and well-being of all children. as the pediatric teaching facility for northwestern university feinberg school of medicine, this commitment drives us to be a…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is St Jude Children's Research Hospital Inc and the most unlike its peers is The Michelle McGann Fund Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
13 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. 13 of the 23 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 FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ↗
- Who funds Lost Tree Village Charitable Foundation ↗
- Who funds Northwestern University ↗
- Who funds THE PAT GREEN FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CHILDREN'S HOME & AID SOCIETY OF ILL ↗
- Who funds Nicklaus Children's Health Care Foundation ↗
- Who funds MISERICORDIA HOME ↗
- Who funds The Michelle McGann Fund Inc ↗
- Who funds Madonna Mission ↗
- Who funds ST JUDE CHILDREN'S RESEARCH HOSPITAL INC ↗
- Who funds MILLENNIUM PARK FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds University of Chicago ↗
- Who funds PLAY FOR PINK 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: National Philanthropic Trust · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund
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 Sam Family Foundation 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.
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.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Sam Family Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Sam Family Foundation 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.