Corry Family Foundation

The Corry Family Foundation is a small, family-run memorial foundation, not an institutional grantmaker — there is no program staff, no published RFP, and no board beyond William Corry (President), Darcy Corry (Vice President), and Alexis Corry (Treasurer), all of whom serve without compensation. It was formalized in June 2022 (IRS ruling date 202206) in memory of Lindsay Nicole Corry, who was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at eleven months old, earned undergraduate and graduate degrees from Carnegie Mellon University, volunteered extensively at diabetes camps, and died of cancer in 2021 at age 30. Every funding decision runs through this personal lens: the foundation is looking for organizations whose work echoes Lindsay's own story — young people confronting identity-altering illness, trauma, disability, or the psychological aftermath (PTSD, loss of identity) of serious disease, rather than broad-based health or human-services programming. Grant seekers should treat this as a relationship-first funder. The path in is a simple contact form (name, email, phone, free-text comment) reviewed weekly by the family directly; there is no LOI stage, no formal application portal, and no published deadline. If the family sees alignment, the next step is a direct conversation to discuss the organization's needs — closer to a personal introduction than a competitive proposal review. With only $140,638-$203,796 in annual grants paid against $5.5-7.2M in assets, the foundation is not yet a high-volume grantmaker; its FY2022-2023 grant history shows one dominant award ($200,000, unrestricted, to The Lindsay Theater) alongside three much smaller gifts ($3,545, $200, and $51), suggesting the family concentrates meaningful dollars on a small number of causes with strong personal resonance while remaining open to modest gestures elsewhere. First-time applicants should lead with a clear, human narrative connecting their program to youth, trauma recovery, or identity-altering illness, keep the initial ask modest and program-specific (camps, counseling, peer support, individual-level services rather than capital campaigns), and expect a personal, unhurried process rather than a standardized review committee.

The DB-recorded grant history captures 4 grants totaling $203,796 (FY2022), for an average of $50,949 per grant — but that average masks extreme concentration: The Lindsay Theater received a single unrestricted grant of $200,000 (98% of total dollars in that batch), while the remaining three grants were The O'Noir Foundation ($3,545), Chamber of Commerce ($200), and Epilepsy Foundation ($51). All four recorded grantees are based in Pennsylvania, notable given the foundation's Vero Beach, FL headquarters — a reflection of the Corry family's ties to Sewickley, PA and Lindsay's education at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh. Every recorded grant was unrestricted/general operating support rather than project-restricted, indicating the family prefers to trust grantees with flexible funding once alignment is established. Year-over-year, grants paid fell from $203,796 (FY2022) to $140,638 (FY2023), a 31% decline, even as the foundation's asset base grew from $4,671,306 to $5,531,288 over the same period — and has since grown further to a currently reported $7,201,566. The foundation received $1,000,000 in new contributions in FY2023 (on top of $4,692,396 in FY2021, its formation year, when zero grants were paid), which indicates the family is still building the corpus rather than maximizing annual distribution; total revenue swung from $4,692,396 (FY2021, dominated by the founding contribution) to $206,031 (FY2022) to $1,013,067 (FY2023). Net investment income was $204,418 in FY2022 and just $9,408 in FY2023. Officer compensation appeared only in FY2022 ($20,000, likely part-time administrative support) and was $0 in both FY2021 and FY2023. Given the small, growing grant pool and the extreme concentration around one flagship recipient, applicants should expect that most available dollars in any given year may already be earmarked for organizations with an established family relationship, with smaller discretionary gifts (in the hundreds to low thousands) available to newer causes that demonstrate strong mission fit.

The Corry Family Foundation's current reported assets ($7.2M) place it squarely among a cluster of similarly sized independent, family-run Philanthropy & Grantmaking foundations nationally, though its actual annual grant output remains modest relative to that asset base.

All five peers cluster within roughly $1,300 of Corry's asset level ($7.20-7.203M), making them a useful benchmarking set for a small, single-family independent foundation, but only Corry and the David And Lorna Gladstone Foundation maintain a public website with any application guidance — the other three appear to operate without a public-facing intake process, which is common for foundations at this asset tier that rely on personal networks rather than open solicitation. Corry stands out among this peer group for publishing a clear (if minimal) application path and a specific, memorial-driven mission statement, which gives outside applicants an actual entry point that most peers of similar size do not offer.

Web research turned up no dated 2025-2026 press releases, grant announcements, or leadership changes for The Corry Family Foundation specifically — its own News page (corryfamilyfoundation.org/blogs/news) is currently a placeholder with no posts, and third-party foundation databases (GuideStar, Cause IQ, Instrumentl, ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer, Zeffy) surface only structured 990 financial data rather than news coverage. This is consistent with a small, quiet family foundation that has not sought press attention. (Note: search results also surfaced an unrelated organization, the Corry Community Foundation of Corry, Pennsylvania — a regional community foundation celebrating its 25th anniversary in 2025-2026 — which should not be confused with The Corry Family Foundation of Vero Beach, FL; the two are entirely separate entities despite the similar name.) In the absence of recent news, the most concrete recent activity is financial: the foundation received $1,000,000 in new family contributions in FY2023 and grew total assets to a currently reported $7,201,566, up from $4,671,306 at the end of FY2022 — a roughly 54% increase over that period, largely from continued family funding rather than investment returns (net investment income fell from $204,418 in FY2022 to just $9,408 in FY2023). Leadership has remained stable and unchanged across all three most recent fiscal years: William Corry (President), Darcy Corry (Vice President), and Alexis Corry (Treasurer), all uncompensated. Given the foundation's growing asset base, grant seekers should expect grantmaking capacity to expand over the next 1-2 years, even though FY2023 grants paid ($140,638) actually declined from FY2022 ($203,796).

There is no formal proposal template, deadline, or online portal — the entire intake process runs through the contact form at corryfamilyfoundation.org/pages/contact, which asks only for name, email (required), phone, and a comment field. The foundation states plainly: "Please feel free to include any and all information that you find helpful to our understanding your cause," so the comment field should be used as a condensed case statement (organization mission, the specific youth/trauma/identity-altering-illness population served, funding need, and requested amount) rather than a one-line inquiry. The foundation reviews submissions weekly and only proceeds to a phone/personal conversation if it sees alignment — treat the initial form as a screening step, not the full pitch. Because the board is three family members with no program staff, avoid generic mail-merge language; instead, explicitly connect the request to Lindsay Nicole Corry's own story (Type 1 Diabetes from infancy, Carnegie Mellon education, an 18-month cancer battle, death at 30 in 2021) and the "Love Like Lindsay" ethos of helping children through creative expression and peer support. The strongest historical fit is small-to-midsize nonprofits delivering individual-level support — camps, clinical/psychological support, peer mentoring, patient advocacy — rather than large capital campaigns or general community-development asks (note: the foundation's own IRS/NTEE classification lists "Community Development," but its actual public mission and grant history are squarely health/trauma/youth-focused, so lead with the health/trauma framing, not a generic community-development pitch). Given that the one large recorded grant ($200,000 to The Lindsay Theater) and all four recorded grants went to Pennsylvania-based organizations despite the Florida headquarters, applicants with a Pittsburgh/Sewickley-area or Carnegie Mellon connection may have an edge, though the foundation states it remains "open to supporting additional charitable opportunities" beyond its core focus. Common mistakes to avoid: submitting a large capital-project ask before any relationship exists, omitting a clear connection to youth/trauma/identity-altering illness, and expecting a fast turnaround beyond the stated weekly review cycle — this is a low-volume, high-touch funder, so patience and a genuine follow-up (not repeated resubmission) after 2-3 weeks of silence is the right approach.