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Wisconsin Masonic Foundation at a glanceAlso receives grants: funding profile →

· Public charity

Wisconsin Masonic Foundation

Created for the purposes of encouraging charity, benevolence, education and philanthropy, and of securing greater uniformity of purposes, powers and duties of administration in the management and control of property given, devised or bequeathed for charitable, benevolent, educational or philanthropic purposes.

$1.3M
Granted FY2025still arriving
7
Grants FY2025still arriving
1
States reached
$741k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
05Through PlinthRead
01What it funds
01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.

Human Services$7.8MEducation$423kPhilanthropy$256kEmployment$36kCommunity Improvement$15kRecreation & Sports$15kHealth$6k
02FY2025 · 7 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

How this is measured
The 7 grants below total $879,331, the rows itemized in this filing. The $1,328,985 headline is the total grant expense on the return; the other $449,654 is giving the schedule does not break out (grants under the $5,000 itemization floor, grants to individuals, grants on other schedules). Every figure below describes the itemized rows only.

By grant size · FY2025

  • Under $10k2 grants · $14k
  • $10k–50k3 grants · $64k
  • $50k–250k1 grant · $60k
  • $250k+1 grant · $741k
$20,751
Median grant
1
States reached
$31M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC$740,908
BEAVER DAM SCHOOL DISTRICT$60,224
CHILDREN'S DYSLEXIA CENTER MILW$23,333
CHILDREN'S DYSLEXIA CENTER MADISON$20,751
CHILDREN'S DYSLEXIA CENTER UPPER WI$20,101
MATC$7,007
WISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE & TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION$7,007
02The need
03

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Its human-services grants (FY17–25, $7.8M) land where the poverty rate runs at 5%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 0% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants skew toward lower-need ZIPs.

area typical 9%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $1.7M → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $785k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $768k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $768k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $767k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $764k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $741k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $739k → 5%WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $712k → 5%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
How this is measured
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.
How this is measured
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

100%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$8.5M · 7 repeat orgs$21k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +26% since the first grant, against -10% for those funded once.

7 repeat relationships: 5 still active in FY2025, 2 since wound down.

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

7
3

Total granted

$8.5M
$21k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+26%
-10%

Still filing today

71%
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
EducationHuman ServicesPhilanthropyOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). 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

  • WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC
    9× · 2017–2025 · $7.8M · revenue +181%
  • TF
    THE FOUNDATION OF THE WISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE & TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION
    5× · 2021–2025 · $36k · revenue +26%
  • WA
    WISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE AND TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION INC
    2× · 2019–2020 · $15k · revenue +61%

Funded once

  • WV
    WISCONSIN VETERANS FISHING CAMP INC
    one grant, 2020 · $7k
  • WH
    WISCONSIN HERO OUTDOORS INC
    one grant, 2020 · $7k · revenue -10%
  • TH
    THE HIKE FUND INC
    one grant, 2018 · $6k · revenue -25%
How this is measured

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

04Its field
04the grantee network

7 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 7 of the 10 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
1
Early backer (in before they grew)
7/7
Grantees still filing
3/7
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

WISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $7,793,242 · Human ServicesWISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INCBEAVER DAM UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT: $398,224 · OtherWISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE AND TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION INC: $15,290 · Other+4 more: $31,368 · OtherCHILDREN'S DYSLEXIA CENTERS INC: $255,912 · PhilanthropyTHE FOUNDATION OF THE WISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE & TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION: $35,958 · EducationMILWAUKEE AREA TECHNICAL COLLEGE FOUNDATION INC: $13,921 · Education
Human Services$7,793,242Other$444,882Philanthropy$255,912Education$49,879

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetWISCONSIN MASONIC HOME INC: $7,793,242 over 9y, 18% of budgetCHILDREN'S DYSLEXIA CENTERS INC: $255,912 over 8y, 1.1% of budgetTHE FOUNDATION OF THE WISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE & TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION: $35,958 over 5y, 0.5% of budgetWISCONSIN AUTOMOBILE AND TRUCK DEALERS ASSOCIATION INC: $15,290 over 2y, 0.4% of budgetMILWAUKEE AREA TECHNICAL COLLEGE FOUNDATION INC: $13,921 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetWISCONSIN HERO OUTDOORS INC: $7,404 over 1y, 4.4% of budgetTHE HIKE FUND INC: $6,000 over 1y, 2.9% of budget
Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a set of overlaps that mostly run through this funder rather than between each other.

Jerome J and Dorothy …
Jerome J and Dorothy H Holz Family Foundation C/O Donald TushausWI13.6× affinity4 shared granteesties to 0 of 0Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Jerome J and Dorothy H Holz Family Foundation C/O Donald Tushaus

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Wisconsin Masonic Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Wisconsin Masonic Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 10%1%5%11%20%funder's share of their income ↑0%25%50%75%100%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    1get no government money at all
    1report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    0rely on government for over half their income
    typical government reliance, FY20–25
    How this is measured
    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 a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than 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 to 24 months.
    05Through Plinth

    Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

    How do I get to Wisconsin Masonic Foundation?

    Find your warmest path to Wisconsin Masonic 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.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 10 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its 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.

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

    Source object · view filing

    Play a game based on Wisconsin Masonic’s filings →

    More from the funding graph

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    The regranting layer
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    $9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
    The endowment market
    who holds foundation money, and what just moved
    The camps
    funders cluster by geography, not ideology
    By state
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