At the Tenth Anniversary celebration of the Foundation held at Drinker Biddle’s event space in its Washington, D.C. office, Jerry Hartman, President of the Barbara McDowell Foundation, gave a short presentation about Barbara’s beliefs in social justice and the history of the Foundation. The essence of Barbara’s views, as expressed by Jerry, were as follows:
As Barbara expressed it to me, echoing the same words of Lyra McKee, the Northern Ireland journalist recently murdered, Barbara saw the poor in America, like the poor in Northern Ireland, having a “poverty of vision” and a “poverty of ambition.” Much, much too often Barbara believed mainstream Americans cast a blind eye on their fellow Americans living in squalor who wanted nothing more than the same equal opportunity enjoyed by so many privileged Americans. Barbara strove to vanquish that sad image.
View Jerry's remarks in the video below or read his remarks here. (May 2019)