RE:source is a publication of the Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC), where a team of archivists, educators, and historians share stories, photo essays, timelines, educational resources, and updates on new research in RAC collections.

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New in our RAC Research Reports Series

New Research

New Research: Prison Plastic Surgery, Indian Fellowships, Thai Nursing Program, and Nam June Paik

The latest RAC New Research series highlights reports from archival research by stipend recipients, covering diverse subjects from prison plastic surgery policies in the Civil Rights era to Indian art fellowship impacts and the roots of Thai nursing education. It includes discussions on the effects of patronage on video art and Thai-Filipino-American healthcare interactions, revealing the historical role of Rockefeller and Ford Foundations in enabling progressive social and cultural studies.

Black History is Philanthropy History

Race & Social Justice

Ted Watkins and the Rockefeller Foundation: An Unlikely Partnership

How a charismatic community activist from Watts challenged a foundation’s civil rights strategy through a jobs training program.

Black African American Boy Scout Leaders (Scoutmasters) pose for a photograph, sitting in rows with an American flag
Race & Social Justice

Who Belongs in the Boy Scouts? Philanthropy’s Support for Black Scouting

A foundation struggled to make one of America’s oldest youth organizations more racially inclusive. But it only got so far under Jim Crow.

Issues in Philanthropy

Funding a Social Movement: The Ford Foundation and Civil Rights, 1965-1970

A story recounting many accusations, from rigged elections to the meddling of big private money in grassroots organizing.

Race & Social Justice

Photo Essay: Supporting Minority Enterprise in the late 1960s

In 1968, the Ford Foundation began to make social investments using a new tool borrowed from the for-profit world, the Program-Related Investment.

Race & Social Justice

Black Education and Rockefeller Philanthropy from the Jim Crow South to the Civil Rights Era

Applying a vast fortune to the American race problem, but with decades of false assumptions and well-intended approaches that fell short.

Race & Social Justice

“Highest Standards”: Elite Philanthropy and Literary Black Voices during the Civil Rights Era

Against a backdrop of white, establishment concepts of literary excellence, one foundation struggled to appreciate Black voices.

Elementary children of diverse ethnic backgrounds get ready to go inside their school, two hold hands
Race & Social Justice

Can Data Drive Social Change? Tackling School Segregation with Numbers

In the years before Brown v. Board, a philanthropic fund hoped research and data would turn the tide on attitudes toward segregation.


In Case You Missed It

Left side of the political poster reads "Éire" (Ireland), right side reads "West Britain". In between both images reads "Seachtain na Saoirse". Bottom of the print reads "On which side are you on? Language Collection Now On."
Global Engagement

The Irish Language Debate: Nationalism and Rockefeller Foundation Medical Education Reform in the Irish Free State

Ireland’s independence revived the nationalist campaign for mandatory Irish language. The debate discouraged Rockefeller Foundation funders.