Our History

Our History

In 1973, Greater Toledo Community Foundation came to life and began to grow. It was many years earlier, however, that the idea of a community foundation was introduced by local banks and a Toledo businessman who cared deeply about the future of our community.

In the late 1920’s, representatives of local banks worked together to complete all of the legal work necessary to form a community foundation. In doing so, these individuals envisioned an organization that would one day steward the charitable wishes of many different citizens and perpetually benefit the Toledo area.

Walter E. Terhune, who then owned the local lumber company of Clarke and Terhune, shared that vision and made provisions for the financing that would one day allow this organization (which existed only on paper) to become an active, vibrant part of the community. Through a trust created before he died, Mr. Terhune left his lumber fortune to support his daughter – Alice Crosby Terhune – during her lifetime. The trust provided that, upon Alice’s death, a portion of his estate was to go to Greater Toledo Community Foundation.

Alice Crosby Terhune, who lived in Toledo all her life, passed away in the early 1970s. In 1973, $145,000 from her father’s trust – created 45 years earlier – established the Walter E. Terhune Fund, the first grantmaking endowment of Greater Toledo Community Foundation.

During that first year, $1,425 in grants were made to support local charitable projects. From this initial gift, your community foundation has grown and flourished to what it is today.

Since 1973, generous donors have created more than 1,000 funds, which today have a combined market value of over $400 million. Cumulative grants to support charitable projects over 50 years have totaled more than $269 million, with approximately $24.5 million granted in 2023 alone.