History

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The Pew Charitable Trusts, an independent nonprofit, is the sole beneficiary of seven individual charitable funds established between 1948 and 1979 by two sons and two daughters of Sun Oil Co. founder Joseph Newton Pew and his wife, Mary Anderson Pew. Honoring their parents’ religious conviction that good works should be done quietly, the original Pew Memorial Foundation was a grantmaking organization that made donations anonymously.

Early priorities included cancer research, the Red Cross, and a pioneering project to assist historically Black colleges. In 1957, the foundation was restructured and its assets were transferred to The Pew Memorial Trust.

Between 1957 and 1979, six other trusts were created, representing the personal and complementary philanthropic interests of four committed siblings: J. Howard Pew, Mary Ethel Pew, Joseph Newton Pew Jr., and Mabel Pew Myrin.

Peter Chadwick

Pew’s interest in federal policy began in 1986 with the establishment of a program on economics and national security. And in 1994 we began working on a robust research portfolio examining state policy, producing landmark reports on education, state prisons, and election administration.

Pew’s public opinion research began in 1995, when the Times Mirror Center became the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. In 2004, Pew Research Center was created, bringing together all of our work on public opinion polling, demographic research, content analysis, and other data-driven social science research into a separate nonprofit Pew subsidiary. The Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes, and trends shaping the world. It does not take policy positions.

In 2002, The Pew Charitable Trusts became a public charity, giving us more flexibility to engage in new initiatives and operate programs for maximum effectiveness and efficiency. We expanded our conservation work internationally, and we created projects to protect vital habitats; improve public health and safety; protect Americans’ economic opportunity; and help elected leaders be responsive, use public dollars wisely, and build a better future for all.

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After opening a small office in Washington, D.C., in 2003, we moved to a larger space in 2008 to allow for more collaboration with other nonprofit organizations and facilitate educational programs for policymakers and the public. And we have increased our collaborations with partners to amplify our impact.

Throughout our history, we have remained committed to the civic life of Philadelphia. Inspired by the founders’ belief in the importance of an informed democracy, we provide timely, impartial research and analysis that helps Philadelphia’s citizens and leaders understand and address key issues facing the city. We also support the best of the regional cultural community, in large part through the efforts of the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage. And we work with the region’s leading health and social service organizations to serve some of the most vulnerable members of the community.

Today Pew is a global, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization with three broad goals:

• Improve public policy by conducting rigorous analysis, linking diverse interests to pursue common cause, and insisting on tangible results.
• Inform the public by providing useful data that illuminates the issues and trends shaping our world.
• Invigorate civic life by encouraging democratic participation and strong communities, particularly in our hometown of Philadelphia.