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Charles Stewart Mott Foundation |
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C. S. Mott and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation
Imagine a man who was successful at many different careers in his lifetime. A sailor, a corporate executive, a politician, an engineer, a philanthropist. This was the life led by Charles Stewart Mott, born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1875, to John Coon Mott and Isabella Turnbull Stewart.
By a young age, Charles Stewart Mott, known as C. S., experienced a number of these careers. C. S. attended the Stevens Institute of Technology where he earned a degree in mechanical engineering in 1897. He then worked for his father, an independent businessman, but within a year, the war with Spain caused Mott to join the Navy where he served as Gunner's Mate First Class on the U.S.S. "Yankee." After the war ended, C. S. returned to work in the family's beverage and carbonating machinery companies.
Shortly after his arrival, unexpected changes occurred in Mott's life. His father died, and within months, C. S. moved to Utica, N.Y., to supervise one of his family's companies, the Weston-Mott Co., that manufactured wire wheels. Then, he married Ethel Culbert Harding on June 14, 1900. After the wedding, his uncle relinquished his position at the Weston-Mott Co., leaving its management to C.S. He successfully expanded the company to include axle production. Then Mott made a crucial move that resulted in great growth for Weston-Mott and a lifetime of commitment to the community he would come to call home. He had an offer from W. C." Billy" Durant, the new head of Buick Motor Company, to produce axles for Buick and move the Weston-Mott Co. to Flint, Michigan.
The next years were busy and productive ones for Mott. After Billy Durant established General Motors, he named C. S. Mott to GM's board of directors in 1913, a position he held until his death. In 1916, he became a vice president of the company. The Weston-Mott Company was absorbed into General Motors. Though his business responsibilities were many, Mott managed to spend time with his family (Ethel and their three children, Aimee, Elsa, and Harding) and to actively participate in local community affairs. He was elected Flint's mayor in 1912, 1913, and 1918. World War I followed and again he served his country, this time as a major in the Army's Motor Branch.
In the following years, C. S. faced extensive personal change. In 1924, he and his children survived the death of his wife, Ethel Harding Mott. In 1926, C. S. Mott created the Mott Foundation. Initial grants were made to local service organizations in Flint, as well as higher education institutions. The foundation also supported development of a boy's camp in the Flint area. In 1934, Mott married again. His wife was Ruth Rawlings of El Paso, Texas. She also became a philanthropist in later years with creation of the Ruth Mott Fund. Ruth and C. S. Mott had three children, Susan, Stewart and Maryann.
Begining in the mid 1930s, the Mott Foundation expanded primarily through the development and support of community education locally, nationally and eventually overseas. Mott's own interests in young people and the community were evident as he partnered with Frank J. Manley to create community schools in Flint. These schools included after-school recreational and enrichment activities for youth and their families. The partnership of these two men began in 1935 when C. S. committed Mott funding to help keep six Flint schools open after hours. By the early 1960s, all of Flint's schools were operating as community schools with a range of community education programs.
Since the 1960s, the Mott Foundation has expanded support of the community school concept beyond Flint, throughout the United States and internationally, and has recently underwritten major support for the 21st Century Community Learning Centers Initiative. Further, with significant growth in assets over these years, the Foundation expanded domestic grantmaking in a range of subject areas and opened two foreign offices to monitor its grantmaking in Central/Eastern Europe and South Africa. The Foundation, with estimated year-end assets of $2.93 billion, made 606 grants totaling $153.7 million in 2000.
During the last two decades of Mott's life, he was awarded many honors. In 1954, the International Big Brother of the Year award was presented to him by President Dwight D. Eisenhower for his work to better the lives of youth. He received the American Legion's medal for distinguished service. Other awards and recognition came from the American Schools and Colleges Association, the Michigan Society of Professional Engineers, the American Federation of Labor, and the Michigan Legislature.
Charles Stewart Mott died in 1973. Perhaps the final words written about Motts' philosophy best summarize the man and his mission. "We recognize that our obligation to fellow men does not stop at the boundaries of the community. In an even larger sense, every man is in partnership with the rest of the human race in the eternal conquest which we call civilization."