September 19, 2010 | Read Time: 1 minute
Spirited Commitment: The Samuel and Saidye Bronfman Family Foundation
By Roderick MacLeod and Eric John Abrahamson
Sam Bronfman, founder of Distillers Corporation Limited, which would eventually acquire the Seagram’s spirits company, and his wife Saidye, were accomplished philanthropists because they encouraged their family foundation to work closely with grantees and because the causes they supported reflected their personal interests, write Roderick MacLeod and Eric John Abrahamson in this chronicle of the fund.
The authors, both historians, document the foundation’s programs in the arts, community development, and scientific research that they contend furthered not only Jewish philanthropy but also Canadian philanthropy at large. Notable about the fund was its practice of providing consultants or hiring staff for struggling organizations in lieu of giving money or directly helping grantees with crafting proposals.
Publisher: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1010 Sherbrooke West, Suite 1720, Montreal, Quebec, H3A 2R7 Canada; (514) 398-3750; fax (514) 398-4333; http://mqup.mcgill.ca/; 404 pages; $49.95; ISBN: 978-0-7735-3710-1.
