American Revolution philanthropy did not begin with a billionaire’s bequest. It took root when figures like John Hancock, who signed the Declaration of Independence 250 years ago, and his contemporaries embraced organized efforts to aid strangers, setting a pattern that endures in U.S. civic life today.
Roughly a decade after declaring independence, Hancock joined a Massachusetts charity dedicated to rescuing drowning victims. Historians note that this, too, was revolutionary, part of a broader shift after 1783 as Americans used philanthropy to pursue life, liberty and happiness. Curators at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History point to everyday volunteering and donating, highlighted in its Giving in America exhibition, as a continuation of those ideals.
Charity in North American colonies
Born in Braintree, Massachusetts, on Jan. 23, 1737, Hancock grew up under the guidance of his uncle Thomas Hancock, a wealthy Boston merchant involved in the slave trade and military contracting. Thomas Hancock’s charitable bequests included Communion silver for his church, with his name engraved on the plates, signaling how elite white men dominated philanthropy in the colonial era. After John’s father died, his uncle prepared him for business and civic leadership.
Colonists in need could receive poor relief from local authorities, seek aid from churches and neighbors, or rely on small ethnic mutual aid groups such as Boston’s Scots Society. The mid-1700s saw new welfare and educational institutions, including colleges and charity schools. Benjamin Franklin helped found Pennsylvania Hospital with a mix of public and private funds, a model that later became standard. War disrupted this momentum, but after independence the number of charitable groups quickly expanded.
Humane societies to protect people
Beginning in the 1780s, Americans created organizations to support the vulnerable. Among them was the Humane Society of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, joined by Hancock and Paul Revere, which rewarded those who risked their lives to save drowning people and assist shipwrecked sailors. Similar efforts emerged in several U.S. cities and across the British Isles, the Caribbean and Europe. These networks shared resuscitation techniques, exchanged practical advice and offered moral support. In this period, “humane” commonly described charities serving people, long before it was closely linked to animal welfare.
Philanthropy’s meaning at the time
In the 1700s and much of the 1800s, philanthropy meant love of humanity, derived from the Greek words for love, philos, and man, anthropos. For the founding generation, that ideal emphasized aiding strangers beyond one’s local, religious or ethnic circle. Spurred by African American advocacy, some prominent white Americans, including Alexander Hamilton, joined antislavery societies as Northern states gradually enacted antislavery laws. Making maritime travel safer for people of all backgrounds also expressed universal benevolence.
Humane societies both rescued and honored Black and foreign mariners using the same criteria as for white rescuers. In 1794, the Massachusetts Humane Society conferred one of its highest honors on Dolphin Garler, a Black man in Plymouth, Massachusetts, for saving a boy from drowning, a public recognition that challenged white Americans to acknowledge Black humanity.
Other institutions crossed ethnic and denominational lines. New York Hospital embraced a motto of “charity to all” and treated a diverse patient population, including British, Irish and German patients and smaller numbers from places such as Portugal and South Asia, while caring for African Americans in segregated wards. The Society for the Relief of Poor Widows with Small Children, founded in New York City in 1797, assisted poor widows and helped them find work. While it excluded African American women, it brought a broader, nonsectarian approach to aiding white women regardless of ethnic or religious background.
New leaders with new causes
The Widows Society was also among the first U.S. charities founded and led by women. Before the late 1780s, women typically gave alms or contributed to male-led institutions, but they rarely ran organizations. In 1797, Scottish immigrant Isabella Graham and other women from varied Protestant traditions established the Widows Society in New York. Within a few years, Eliza Hamilton, the wife of Alexander Hamilton, joined and helped lead the Orphan Asylum Society of the City of New York, which grew out of the Widows Society, later memorialized in popular culture.
Black Americans also pioneered independent charities and churches in the founding era. In 1787, Richard Allen and Absalom Jones organized the Free African Society in Philadelphia, a mutual aid group that supported members in times of need and catalyzed the creation of independent Black churches as African Americans pressed for inclusion.
Revolutionizing charity management
Creating charities was only the start. Americans adapted managerial skills from commerce, churches and households to run aid organizations effectively. Fundraising grew more sophisticated, from cultivating donors to staging events and issuing annual reports that listed contributors. Philadelphia physician and Declaration signer Benjamin Rush was a prominent communicator who partnered with leaders like Isabella Graham and Richard Allen across medical philanthropy, education, antislavery and prison reform. He published excerpts of correspondence in newspapers to build momentum for humanitarian efforts.
Contemporaries shared faith in philanthropy’s capacity to improve society. In 1788, George Washington praised the Massachusetts Humane Society’s provisions for shipwrecked mariners as worthy of every “philanthropic mind,” calling such works of charity signs of further progress. Collaboration across the Atlantic on these causes helped Americans and Britons renew their ties beyond politics.
Bedrock of the American experiment in philanthropy
Only in the late 1800s and early 1900s, when industrialists such as Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller began endowing large foundations, did philanthropy become widely associated with large-scale giving. As the United States marks the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, historians argue it is worth recalling that the founding generation treated civic engagement, organizational innovation and generosity as central to the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. For them, philanthropy, understood as love of humanity, underpinned the American experiment in republican government.
Today, experts continue to trace that legacy through modern humanitarian initiatives and technology-driven efforts to broaden access to aid, including projects highlighted in IEEE Humanitarian Technologies spotlight social impact. The enduring thread from early mutual aid societies to contemporary global campaigns underscores how deeply philanthropy is woven into American civic life.