Richard Lounsbery Foundation

The Richard Lounsbery Foundation is a philanthropic organisation which "aims to enhance national strengths in science and technology" (in the United States) by supporting research projects, science education and key scientific policy issues through seed money or partial support. It "aims to achieve high impact by funding novel projects and forward-looking leaders." It was set up with Richard Lounsbery's family's wealth and distributes a total of about $2.5 million each year mostly in grants of $25,000-$100,000. The late David Abshire served as both a director of the foundation, and as president of the foundation's staff.

The foundation takes a special interest in cooperative activities between French and American scholars. It may have been the first philanthropic organization to fund the Wikimedia Foundation [1]. Lounsbery's early role as a benefactor of Wikipedia/Wikimedia is recognized for 2005 to 2008 at [2] and for 2008 to 2009 at [3]. A prospective Lounsbery grant in late 2004 accelerated Wikimedia to get US Internal Revenue Service approval as an educational foundation in April 2005.

The foundation has funded the work of global warming skeptic Fred Singer , and been listed as a conservative funder of colleges in the United States[4]. Its largest and most frequent grantees include the American Museum of Natural History, U.S. National Academy of Sciences, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Philosophical Society, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Awards and grants

Awards supported by the foundation include:

• The Richard Lounsbery Award in biology or medicine.[5]
• The France-Amerique Book Award, for the best book on France from the United States, and the best book on the United States from France. Since 1987. [6]

References and external links

• Official website