What Good People Do --"There are no pockets in a shroud."

Thanks to reader DIG S for this article; as he says, "An inspiring story of true altruism (or how opening duty free shops can make you damn rich)."


Chuck Feeney, who nudges others to give while living, plans to donate $8 billion by 2016. Just don't put his name on anything.
By Margot Roosevelt
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
March 8, 2008

NEW YORK — One by one, speakers rose to toast the elderly gent with
baggy pants and a shy, gaptoothed smile.

"Of course, he didn't wear a tie tonight," teased one. Another called
attention to the honoree's cheap watch and the plastic bag that
serves as his briefcase.

The joshing at a Manhattan gathering would have been nothing out of
the ordinary except that the man pulling a worn blue blazer over his
head in mock modesty was none other than the onetime billionaire,
Chuck Feeney.

Never heard of him? No surprise there.

Over the years, the frugal 76-year-old has made a fetish out of
anonymity. He declined to name his foundation, Atlantic
Philanthropies, after himself, registering the $8-billion behemoth in
Bermuda to avoid U.S. disclosure laws. He lavishes hundreds of
millions of dollars on universities and hospitals but won't allow
even a small plaque identifying him as a donor.

"We just didn't want to be blowing our horn," he explains in a rare
interview at his daughter's Upper East Side apartment.

The party was to celebrate a biography of the elusive tycoon by Irish
journalist Conor O'Clery, titled "The Billionaire Who Wasn't: How
Chuck Feeney Secretly Made and Gave Away a Fortune," published last
fall.

Feeney said he cooperated with the book and submitted to an interview
because he is driven by a new public mission: nudging hedge fund
heavies and silicon scions into "giving while living."

***
Feeney suggests with a cryptic smile, "There's a thin line between
sanity and the other side. Some people might even say the idea of
giving money away is crazy."

For those folks, Feeney has a Gaelic proverb: "There are no pockets
in a shroud."
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