ABSTRACT
The Pullman Land Company, the Railroad YMCA, and the planned communities of Waltham and Lowell were early efforts by company managements to provide social services to the employees of communities for which they felt some responsibility. Federated fund raising and the community chest movement had largely stemmed from a desire by businessmen to assess and simplify the many requests for help their offices were receiving. Company foundations were tax-exempt and legally independent, although they received grants of money from the sponsoring company and, sometimes, from individuals closely associated with it. The organizing and rationalizing process which, in the course of the 1950s, brought business, welfare, educational, and cultural institutions into increasingly close contact led also to more voluminous record-keeping and statistical reporting and analysis than had ever before been possible. The practice of corporate philanthropy had won widespread acceptance not only in the managerial offices of business corporations but also among the American people generally.
