The Frances Perkins Center has been awarded a $30,000 grant from Newman’s Own Foundation, the independent foundation created by the late actor and philanthropist, Paul Newman. The award to the Perkins Center was made by Newman’s Own Foundation as part of its commitment to the empowerment of individuals.

The grant to the Perkins Center will be used to support a traveling educational exhibit about Frances Perkins’ life and legacy. Newman’s Own Foundation joins additional project funders; Katharine J. Watson, the Maine Humanities Council, and the Maine Community Foundation’s Lincoln County Fund.

“The Frances Perkins Center is delighted to receive this grant from Newman’s Own Foundation,” said Michael Chaney, the executive director of the Perkins Center. “We’re going to use this money to help the next generation of students learn about Frances Perkins’ life and legacy.”

The exhibit includes five standing panels interpreting Perkins’ life and legacy, as well as a video featuring work from prominent scholars. The curriculum targets middle and high school students. The Maine Community Foundation’s Lincoln County Fund grant supports exhibition and curriculum specifically for Lincoln County schools. The Newman’s Own Foundation grant supports the creation of a second set of panels and expands the Center’s outreach to schools and libraries in three key states, (Massachusetts, New York, and Washington, D.C.) in addition to Maine, where Perkins worked and lived throughout her career, thus helping us achieve another step in the Center’s long-term goal of reaching a national audience.

Perkins, who was the first woman to serve in a U.S. Cabinet, had deep roots in Maine. During her time as Franklin D. Roosevelt’s secretary of Labor, she regularly returned to her family estate in Newcastle, the place she called her one true home.

Founded in 2008, the Frances Perkins Center preserves and continues Perkins’ legacy. The Center works with historians, biographers, and other scholars to educate the public about Perkins’ life and achievements. It also brings together leaders of today and tomorrow to examine modern public policy questions through the lens of Perkin’s own experiences and values.

If you are an educator and would like to have the Frances Perkins Traveling Exhibit visit your school or program please contact the Center by calling 207-563-3374 or email info@francesperkinscenter.org