· Private foundation
The Orlebeke Foundation
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 $10k1 grant · $5k
- $10k–50k1 grant · $12k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $112k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| STEPPENWOLF THEATRE | $111,600 |
| SKYART NFP | $12,000 |
| ROGER BALDWIN FOUNDATION | $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, $206k) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 100% 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 +59% since the first grant, against -8% for the ones you funded once.
9 repeat relationships — 3 still active in FY2025, 6 since wound down.
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, 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
- STSTEPPENWOLF THEATRE COMPANY8× · 2017–2025 · $891k · revenue +59%
- UIURBAN INITIATIVES INC4× · 2017–2022 · $165k · revenue +125%
- PNPROSPERITY NOW2× · 2017–2018 · $125k · revenue +14%
Funded once
- CFCITIZENS FOR RESPONSIBILITY AND ETHone grant, 2018 · $25k
- SOSTATE OF IL COVID RELIEF FUNDone grant, 2020 · $10k
- AACLUone grant, 2020 · $5k
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.
Lookingglass theatre company is a national leader in the creation and presentation of innovative, cutting-edge theatrical work. lookingglass interweaves movement, circus arts and narrative in original and captivating ways. guided by an…
To enrich the community by producing and presenting exceptional live theatre that touches the heart, engages the mind and delights the spirit.
The chicago public education fund (the fund) is a nonprofit organization that improves public schools in chicago by investing in the talented educators who lead them.
Dream chicago offers joyful art-making experiences and learning opportunities that inspire hope, courage, creativity and community, particularly among chicago's underserved populations. dream chicago connects artists living their dreams…
Open Space Arts is a Chicago-based nonprofit dedicated to producing bold LGBTQ-focused theater and presenting independent queer cinema. The organization supports emerging and established artists while engaging audiences through live…
Chicago children's theatre aspires to enrich our community through diverse and significant theatrical and educational programming that engages and inspires the child in all of us.
The chicago high school for the arts (chiarts) develops the next generation of diverse, artistically promising scholar-artists through intensive pre-professional training in the arts, combined with a comprehensive college preparatory…
To spark curiosity and creativity in all young children through positive, play-based learning experiences.
Writers Theatre (WT) is a literary organization that operates not-for-profit theatres in Glencoe, Illinois. The Writers Theatre mission is to create intimate connections through astonishing performances and innovative programs; activating…
Timeline theatre company presents stories inspired by history that connect with today's social and political issues. our collaborative organization produces provocative theatre and education programs that engage, entertain, and enlighten.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Hyde Park Art Center and the most unlike its peers is Matthew Shepard Foundation. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
12 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. 12 of the 16 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 STEPPENWOLF THEATRE COMPANY ↗
- Who funds THE KENNEDY-WARREN RESIDENTS ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds URBAN INITIATIVES INC ↗
- Who funds PROSPERITY NOW ↗
- Who funds NEW VENTURE FUND ↗
- Who funds The People's Music School ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF THE CHILDREN - CHICAGO ↗
- Who funds MATTHEW SHEPARD FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds SkyArt NFP ↗
- Who funds CHICAGO PUBLIC MEDIA INC ↗
- Who funds THE HAPPINESS CLUB ↗
- Who funds HYDE PARK ART CENTER ↗
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: The Chicago Community Trust · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · 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 The Orlebeke 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 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.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to The Orlebeke Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Orlebeke 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.