Our Founder, Charles “Chuck” Feeney, was born during the Great Depression and came from a modest background of blue collar Irish-American parents who worked hard to make a good life for their family in Elizabeth, New Jersey. His ancestry traces to County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland.
Early Entrepreneurship
Mr. Feeney was an entrepreneur from an early age and was always thinking of new money-making schemes, including selling Christmas cards door-to-door and teaming with a friend to shovel sidewalks during snowstorms.
He enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1948 and after his service took advantage of a GI Bill scholarship to attend the prestigious Cornell University—becoming the first member of his family to attend college. Since the early 1980s, Cornell has received several Atlantic grants, allowing the university to launch its Life Sciences Initiative, the Tri-Institutional Research Program, the recently announced Applied Sciences New York City Initiative, the Hotel School expansion, transform the North and West campuses, and establish the Cornell Tradition Program, so students like him can attend the university on scholarship while working and doing community service.
After graduating, Mr. Feeney made his way around Europe and eventually co-founded a duty-free business selling cigarettes, alcohol and luxury goods to tourists. The business, Duty Free Shoppers (DFS), became the world’s largest luxury goods retailer.
An inveterate traveler, Mr. Feeney continually expanded the business into new ventures, most of which became hugely successful. He often relied on his instincts in making business decisions and reveled in taking risks. He was also attracted to the underdog, often reaching out to help people who were struggling.
Founding Atlantic
In 1982, he established The Atlantic Foundation, the first and by far the largest of The Atlantic Philanthropies. In 1984, Atlantic received all of the Feeney interests in Duty Free Shoppers. At first operating anonymously, Atlantic has made grants totalling more than $5.5 billion as of December 2010. Mr. Feeney is an active member of the Atlantic Board and is as visionary a philanthropist as a businessman. He often proposes Founding Chairman grants to better the lives of people in a variety of countries.
Accelerating Research, Health Care and Higher Education
In Viet Nam, Mr. Feeney championed strengthening the health care infrastructure and public health system that had been ravaged by the war, and this work continues today. Starting in the 1980s, he was the catalyst for Atlantic’s major contributions to rebuild the Republic of Ireland’s university infrastructure. In addition, Mr. Feeney envisioned creating a knowledge economy to provide modern skills for better jobs, so Atlantic convinced the Irish Government to co-fund a now highly successful research initiative – the Programme for Research in Third Level Institutions.
Founding Chairman grants also have helped to develop state-of-the-art facilities for biomedical research in four states in Australia; establish a world-class life-sciences building at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa; and are greatly expanding biomedical education and research in cardiovascular disease, cancer research and medicine, and women’s and children’s health at the University of California San Francisco. He envisions collaborations among Atlantic-supported institutions, believing that working together will result in greater discoveries in a shorter timeframe.
Giving While Living
Mr. Feeney strongly believes in and promotes the Giving While Living philosophy.
In an effort to raise the level of philanthropy in Australia and simultaneously enhance the sustainability of the 23 biomedical facilities where Atlantic has provided major grants, Mr. Feeney is helping to establish Giving While Living Networks in Tasmania and New South Wales.
While he already had transferred virtually all of his and his family’s asset over 25 years ago, he became a signatory of the Giving Pledge in February 2011, in an effort to inspire the wealthiest individuals and families in America to commit to giving the majority of their wealth to the philanthropic causes and charitable organisations of their choice either during their lifetime or after their death.
Today, Mr. Feeney owns neither a home nor a car. He still travels constantly—often in economy class—and is well known for wearing a $15 watch.
In March 2011, he was inducted into the Irish American Hall of Fame, and received the 2010 Cornell Icon of Industry Award. In 1997,Time Magazine said: “Feeney's beneficence already ranks among the grandest of any living American….”
In his biography, The Billionaire Who Wasn’t, Mr. Feeney said, “I had one idea that never changed in my mind—that you should use your wealth to help people.”
