Without the generosity of Charles and Laura Albright, Public Allies Milwaukee might not have gotten off the ground to help train hundreds of young adults to become nonprofit leaders. The Great Circus Parade and its collection of antique circus wagons, animals and clowns might not have lasted as long as it had as a Milwaukee summertime attraction. Thousands of low-income families in Waukesha might not have had access to free tax preparation and tools that helped move them out of poverty.
The Greater Milwaukee Foundation has relied on resources from the couple’s unrestricted fund over the past 44 years to launch, sustain and grow these projects and hundreds of others. A total of $6.3 million in grants has supported a broad range of community needs, from arts and culture to homelessness.
When the Albrights’ fund was established at the Foundation, the couple had no way of knowing what challenges or needs the region might face in the future. But by creating an unrestricted fund, they trusted that the Foundation, given its history and community knowledge, would be able to meet them effectively and responsibly long after they were gone. Only about 8 percent, or 120, of the Foundation’s more than 1,500 funds are unrestricted. Such funds are a particularly powerful philanthropic tool in that they give the Foundation’s Board the flexibility and support it needs to address the region’s ever-changing needs.
Laura Uihlein Albright was one of seven children of Henry Uihlein, one of the founding brothers of Milwaukee’s famed Schlitz Brewing Company. She died in 1967 at age 90. Charles had a storied career with Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company, serving as its leading salesman for 30 years. He died in 1946 at age 76.
In 1978, following the death of their longtime friend and legal adviser, Charles Ashley, $1.2 million in assets from the Albright’s private foundation was left to the Foundation. At that time, it marked the largest transfer of private foundation funds the Foundation had received since its beginning in 1915.