North Carolina Fund

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The North Carolina Fund was a series of experimental programs conceived at the request of

non-profit corporation to operate for five years only, with a mandate to create experimental projects in education, health, job training, housing, and community development
.

During the summers of 1964 and 1965, the North Carolina Volunteers Program created teams of African-American and white college students to work together and show that communities could be stronger if their members reached across lines of race and class to solve problems of poverty. At the core, it aimed to lessen

civil rights
.

Also by example, the North Carolina Fund served as a model and catalyst for such national programs as

VISTA
, and the Community Action movement.

Creation

Feeling that his education program had spent most of his

U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to come to North Carolina to work on coordinating federal efforts with the state project.[10]

Sanford with President Lyndon B. Johnson on one of his "poverty tours" in Nash County, May 1964

In July 1963 the Ford Foundation committed $7 million to support an anti-poverty project in North Carolina. With additional grants from the other foundations, on July 18 Sanford, Wheeler, Charlie Babcock (a board member of the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation), and C. A. McKnight (the editor of The Charlotte Observer) incorporated the North Carolina Fund.[11] Its goals were to fight poverty and promote racial equality across the state.[12] Since the North Carolina Fund was backed by private organizations and not financed by the state, it could be more flexible in addressing social issues while also avoiding political opposition from segregationists.[13] Sanford was made chairman of the Fund's board.[14] He publicly announced its creation at a press conference on September 30, garnering a positive reception from state newspapers.[15] The organisation had a racially integrated staff—which was unusual at the time—and consulted the local residents it aimed to assist.[16]

Operations

The Fund launched a program that utilized

War on Poverty" programs.[17] Sanford himself was disappointed by Johnson's War on Poverty and the agency responsible for it, the Office of Economic Opportunity, and told federal officials that the goal of their effort should not be to eliminate poverty—which Sanford thought impossible—as much as it should be to reduce the "causes of poverty."[18] Johnson administration officials considered placing Sanford in charge of the office.[19]

One of the North Carolina Fund's prominent programs was

Operation Breakthrough (Durham, North Carolina), an organization in Durham.[citation needed
]

The Fund ceased operations in 1969.[20]

References

  1. ^ Eamon 2014, p. 83.
  2. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, pp. 50–54.
  3. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 59.
  4. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, pp. 59–60, 64.
  5. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, pp. 64–65.
  6. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 65.
  7. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 66.
  8. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, pp. 79–80.
  9. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 81.
  10. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 87.
  11. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 82.
  12. ^ Smith, Aidan (July 2005). "July 1963 – The North Carolina Fund". This Month in North Carolina History. UNC University Libraries. Archived from the original on April 17, 2014. Retrieved June 9, 2008.
  13. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 83.
  14. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 85.
  15. ^ Korstad & Leloudis 2010, p. 88.
  16. ^ Covington & Ellis 1999, p. 332.
  17. ^ Eamon 2014, pp. 83–84.
  18. ^ Covington & Ellis 1999, p. 360.
  19. ^ Goldsmith 2018, p. 135.
  20. ^ Covington & Ellis 1999, p. 330.

Works cited

External links
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