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VPR's coverage of arts and culture in the region.

Coolidge Foundation Receives $1 Million To Hire Amity Shlaes As CEO

For years the legacy of President Calvin Coolidge has centered on his Vermont roots, and qualities like honesty and humility. 

The exhibits at the Coolidge Museum and Education Center in Plymouth Notch emphasize that image and Coolidge’s folksy side.

Downstairs in the same building, in the offices of the Calvin Coolidge Memorial Foundation, a group is working to present another side of Coolidge and build a national following. To do that, the foundation has hired a high profile CEO. 

The Coolidge Foundation was established in 1960 for the purpose of acquiring memorabilia and papers associated with Coolidge.

More than a half century later it has a relatively small membership of about 1,000, and until recently, one full-time employee — a modestly paid executive director.

The most recent tax filing, for 2012, shows revenues of just over $216,000. 

In January, the foundation hired Coolidge biographer Amity Shlaes as full-time CEO.  Her annual compensation is $250,000. Several donors are paying $1 million to provide her salary for four years. 

"There's a renaissance of interest in Coolidge, with Amity Shlaes' new biography, with a lack of civility in our federal government now, contrasted dramatically from the way Coolidge governed." - Former Gov. Jim Douglas

Coolidge Foundation trustee, former Governor Jim Douglas, says it’s a perfect time to hire someone like Shlaes to help increase both the membership and budget of the foundation.

“There’s a renaissance of interest in Coolidge, with Amity Shlaes' new biography, with a lack of civility in our federal government now, [all] contrasted dramatically from the way Coolidge governed,” he says. 

He says there’s also good reason to promote Coolidge now because of concern about the size of government and the federal budget. “Coolidge was the only president under whose tenure the federal government actually got smaller,” says Douglas.

Shlaes is based in New York where she teaches in New York University’s Stern School of Business MBA program.

Douglas says she has a solid reputation as a writer and commentator and a Rolodex full of potential supporters.

The foundation has received a number of state and federal grants and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to contribute to construction of the state-owned museum and education center at the Coolidge Homestead.

In recent years it’s been focused on programming.  It sponsors a speaker’s series and student debates.

“What we want to do is encourage young people to think about public policy and to think about issues that a president faces,” says Matthew Denhart, who has been the foundation’s executive director since December.

The foundation has received a number of state and federal grants and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to contribute to construction of the state-owned museum and education center at the Coolidge Homestead.

Denhart says with increased membership and fundraising, the Coolidge Foundation can expand those activities in Vermont and beyond. Last November, the foundation held its first New York City fundraiser and gave out the first ever annual Coolidge Prize, a $20,000 award to Holman Jenkins, Jr. of the Wall Street Journal.

The Thomas W. Smith Foundation helped to underwrite those efforts and is also contributing a significant amount to cover Shlaes’ salary over the next four years.

The Connecticut-based organization is one of a group of conservative foundations that have been providing money to establish free market studies on college campuses.

In her columns Shlaes has staked out conservative economic views, and she and Denhart worked together at the George W. Bush Presidential Center.

All of this — the conservative foundation funding, the George W. Bush connections, and Shlaes role advocating conservative economic policies — have former trustee Howard Coffin worried the Coolidge Foundation is becoming a platform for promoting conservative ideas.   

“It seems to me that there’s suddenly a very distinct political bent to the organization.  It seems to be a very conservative organization,” he says.

Coffin says he fears the foundation is putting money above the Coolidge legacy. He says it should be careful to avoid appearing partisan.

"I don't think Coolidge needs portraying from a partisan point of view, which seems to be what's happening. I’m not even sure that Calvin Coolidge, if he were alive today, would be a Republican." - Howard Coffin, former Coolidge Foundation trustee

“I don’t think Coolidge needs portraying from a partisan point of view, which seems to be what’s happening.  I’m not even sure that Calvin Coolidge, if he were alive today, would be a Republican,” says Coffin.

Coffin says instead of promoting Coolidge’s economic policies the foundation should promote the qualities Coolidge exemplified and the homestead in Plymouth symbolizes: Rising from modest beginnings to achieve the American Dream, honesty, plain-speaking and civility.

Denhart says there’s more to Coolidge than his personal qualities.

“We think that by highlighting Coolidge as a historical figure you really need to look at his policies,” he says. “He wasn’t just this interesting figure from Vermont, he was the President of our country. If there are lessons people can learn from the presidency, great. Is our intention to push those views? That’s not the case.”

Denhart says some people may see Amity Shlaes as an outspoken policy advocate but the foundation remains non-partisan.  

Shlaes herself, who served on the board of trustees before becoming CEO, does not feel she brings partisanship to the foundation. 

“I am conservative but I am not particularly partisan,” she says. “In this job our work is not to run political campaigns. It is to advance Coolidge, and by the way, Coolidge himself was far more conservative than any of us. He was for low taxes, he was for smaller government, in addition to being pro-teacher, signing a law for teacher wage increases. Our job is to show who he was.”

"I am conservative but I am not particularly partisan. In this job our work is not to run political campaigns. It is to advance Coolidge. And by the way, Coolidge himself was far more conservative than any of us. He was for low taxes, he was for smaller government, in addition to being pro-teacher." - Amity Shlaes, Coolidge Foundation CEO

Shlaes says the experience she brings from her work in fundraising and programming at the George W. Bush Institute will help the Coolidge Foundation reach its goals.

The board of trustees voted unanimously to make Shlaes CEO.

Democratic Senator Alice Nitka, who serves on the board, says she has no concerns that the funding for the position or Shlaes views will create the appearance of partisanship.

Nitka says raising the profile of Vermont’s native son will be good for the foundation and will also draw attention to Vermont and the Coolidge Homestead.

Steve has been with VPR since 1994, first serving as host of VPR’s public affairs program and then as a reporter, based in Central Vermont. Many VPR listeners recognize Steve for his special reports from Iran, providing a glimpse of this country that is usually hidden from the rest of the world. Prior to working with VPR, Steve served as program director for WNCS for 17 years, and also worked as news director for WCVR in Randolph. A graduate of Northern Arizona University, Steve also worked for stations in Phoenix and Tucson before moving to Vermont in 1972. Steve has been honored multiple times with national and regional Edward R. Murrow Awards for his VPR reporting, including a 2011 win for best documentary for his report, Afghanistan's Other War.
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