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Plinth

· Private foundation

The Thorne Foundation

Its FY2017 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$50k
Granted FY2017
24
Grants FY2017
9
States reached
$15k
Largest
01What you fund
01FY2017 · 24 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2017

  • Under $10k23 grants · $35k
  • $10k–50k1 grant · $15k
$500
Median grant
9
States reached
$0
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
SEED GLOBAL HEALTH$15,000
YALE UNIVERSITY FORESTRY SCHOOL$5,000
THE NATURE CONSERVANCY$5,000
AMERICAN ACADEMY IN ROME$5,000
INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART$5,000
THOMAS HEYWARD ACADEMY$5,000
BEAUFORT MEMORIAL HOSPITAL FOUNDATION$2,000
FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION$2,000
COASTAL DISCOVERY MUSEUM$1,000
TULANE UNIVERSITY$500
THE LIVESTOCK CONSERVANY$500
THORNE NATURE EXPERIENCE$500
CAROLINA GOLD RICE FOUNDATION$500
JEKYLL ISLAND FOUNDATION$500
CARNEGIE COUNCIL$500
02The need
02

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:

Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–17) land where the poverty rate runs at 15%, against an area that typically sits at 16%. 75% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 16%CHESTNUT HILL BENEVOLENCE FUND: $250 → 7%THE FIRST CHURCH-CHRIST SCIENTIST: $250 → 8%SEED GLOBAL HEALTH: $15k → 16%AMERICAN ACADEMY IN ROME: $5k → 17%WOODLAWN CONSERVANCY: $250 → 28%COASTAL DISCOVERY MUSEUM: $1k → 10%THE NATURE CONSERVANCY: $5k → 12%THOMAS HEYWARD ACADEMY: $5k → 17%FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION: $2k → 19%FIRST CHURCH-CHRIST SCIENTIST: $150 → 9%THE LIVESTOCK CONSERVANY: $500 → 9%JEKYLL ISLAND FOUNDATION: $500 → 14%THORNE NATURE EXPERIENCE: $500 → 12%TULANE UNIVERSITY: $500 → 23%INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART: $5k → 16%CARNEGIE COUNCIL: $500 → 17%SHELDON ANIMAL RESCUE: $150 → 10%CAROLINA GOLD RICE FOUNDATION: $500 → 12%FIFTH CHURCH OF CHRISTSCIENTIST: $350 → 17%BEAUFORT MEMORIAL HOSPITAL FOUNDATION: $2k → 10%SANTA ELENA FOUNDATION: $250 → 10%HISTORIC BEAUFORT FOUNDATION: $250 → 10%PUBLIC LIBRARY FOUNDATION OF BEAUFORT COUNTY: $100 → 10%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.

Which US states your grants reach

NY
MA
CT
CO
NC
SC
LA
GA
FL

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 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
American Museum of Natural History

The museum's mission statement is: "to discover, interpret, and disseminate - through scientific research and education - knowledge about human cultures, the natural world, and the universe."

Arts & Culture
2
Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden Inc

We harness the power of plants for humankind and share the joy and beauty of tropical gardening with everyone. fairchild tropical botanic garden is a museum of tropical plants within a world famous, 83-acre designed landscape. it was…

Environment
3
The Charleston Museum

To educate Charleston area residents and visitors about the natural and cultural history of the South Carolina Lowcountry through collections, exhibitions, preservation, conservation, research and related programming.

Arts & Culture
4
Boston Architectural College

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

5
Brookgreen Gardens

Brookgreen gardens was formed in 1931 to collect, preserve and exhibit american sculpture, and the flora and fauna native to south carolina.

Environment
6
President and Fellows of Harvard College

Undergraduate, graduate, and professional education and research across a broad array of academic domains.

Education
7
The Coral Reef and Marine Science Foundation Inc C/O James Bildner
8
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Inc

Organization's mission statement true to the ambitious vision of its founder and her spirit of creative risk-taking, the mission of the isabella stewart gardner museum is: - to bring to life and preserve the rich historic collection; - to…

Arts & Culture
9
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
10
Tudor Place Foundation Inc

Tudor place historic house & garden preserves the stories of six generations of descendants of martha washington and the enslaved and free people who lived and worked at this georgetown landmark for nearly two centuries. by examining their…

11
Society of Architectural Historians

The mission of the society is to advance the knowledge and understanding of architecture, design, landscape and urbanism worldwide among scholars, professionals in allied fields (including architecture, historic preservation and planning)…

Arts & Culture
12
Trustees for Harvard University

To facilitate harvard university's scientific, literary, and educational activities in washington, dc.

Education

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Historic Beaufort Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Public Library Foundation of Beaufort County. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

03the grantee network

16 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. 16 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
4
Early backer (in before they grew)
15/16
Grantees still filing
15/16
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

SEED GLOBAL HEALTH — $15,000 · EducationSEED GLOBAL HEALTHTHOMAS HEYWARD ACADEMY INC — $5,000 · EducationTHOMAS HEYWARD ACADEMY INCThe Florida State University Foundation Inc — $2,000 · EducationThe Florida State University Foundation Inc+2 more — $600 · EducationTHE NATURE CONSERVANCY — $5,000 · OtherTHE NATURE CONSERVANCYYALE UNIVERSITY FORESTRY SCHOOL — $5,000 · OtherYALE UNIVERSITY FORESTRY SCH…CARNEGIE COUNCIL — $500 · OtherCAROLINA GOLD RICE FOUNDATION — $500 · Other+5 more — $1,400 · Other+5 moreTHE INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART INC — $5,000 · Arts & CultureTHE INSTITUTE O…COASTAL DISCOVERY MUSEUM — $1,000 · Arts & CultureCOASTAL DISCOVE…JEKYLL ISLAND FOUNDATION INC — $500 · Arts & CultureJEKYLL ISLAND F…HISTORIC BEAUFORT FOUNDATION — $250 · Arts & CultureWOODLAWN CONSERVANCY INC — $250 · Arts & CultureAMERICAN ACADEMY IN ROME — $5,000 · InternationalAMERICAN AC…BEAUFORT MEMORIAL HOSPITAL FOUNDATION — $2,000 · HealthTHORNE ECOLOGICAL INSTITUTE — $500 · EnvironmentTHE LIVESTOCK CONSERVANCY INC — $500 · Food & Nutrition
Education$22,600Other$12,400Arts & Culture$7,000International$5,000Health$2,000Environment$500Food & Nutrition$500

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

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetSEED GLOBAL HEALTH — $15,000 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetTHE NATURE CONSERVANCY — $5,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetTHE INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART INC — $5,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetTHOMAS HEYWARD ACADEMY INC — $5,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetAMERICAN ACADEMY IN ROME — $5,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetThe Florida State University Foundation Inc — $2,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetBEAUFORT MEMORIAL HOSPITAL FOUNDATION — $2,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetCOASTAL DISCOVERY MUSEUM — $1,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetTHORNE ECOLOGICAL INSTITUTE — $500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetTHE LIVESTOCK CONSERVANCY INC — $500 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetTHE ADMINISTRATORS OF THE TULANE EDUCATIONAL FUND — $500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetJEKYLL ISLAND FOUNDATION INC — $500 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetHISTORIC BEAUFORT FOUNDATION — $250 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetWOODLAWN CONSERVANCY INC — $250 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetSanta Elena Foundation — $250 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetPUBLIC LIBRARY FOUNDATION OF BEAUFORT COUNTY — $100 over 1y, 0.1% 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.

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.

Coastal Community Foundation of South Carolina IncSC15.5× affinity5 shared granteesties to 5 of 5Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Coastal Community Foundation of South Carolina Inc · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · 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 Thorne 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.

2024
202122232425
no gov · 10%0%1%3%5%your share of their income ↑0%6%13%19%25%share of the org’s income from governmentmedian 1%
  • The Institute of Contemporary Art Inc1% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
1get no government money at all
6report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–25%
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.

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 23 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 2017, released 2017. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

More from the funding graph