Decade: 1910s

What began as a philanthropic fund to honor its namesake became an early force in the social sciences.

Working to change US medical education was one of the Rockefeller Foundation’s biggest endeavors in the 1910s and 1920s, extending from Johns Hopkins in Baltimore to Beijing, China.

One philanthropist’s interest in reforming prostitution created a scientific organization focused on connecting sex and crime.

A massive program in nursing education extended to 53 schools across the globe. But it never became a top priority of the foundation that supported it.

Programs designed to build public health infrastructure, eradicate disease, and increase access to healthcare have formed the core of more than a hundred years of one foundation’s strategy.

In the early 20th century, the General Education Board was devoted to the cause of improving education throughout the United States, without distinction of race, sex, or creed.

A foundation set on eradicating mosquito-born diseases had to accept that disease control was good enough.

As the scarcity of global resources became increasingly worrisome in the 20th century, these organizations more boldly approached work in population and family planning.

Global war drew a new philanthropy into relief work.

In this month’s edition of the series, the authors have used the records of the Rockefeller Foundation, the Commonwealth Fund, the Ford Foundation, the Office of the Messrs. Rockefeller, and the Near East Foundation.