Legacy

We prioritize relationship-building at the forefront of our process. This allows us to deeply understand the unique challenges and opportunities faced by organizations and ensure that our funding makes a meaningful, lasting change in Duluth.

Albert Ordean’s generous will called for the creation of a charity to administer and furnish relief and charity for Duluth’s poor without discrimination to age, sex, color or religious inclination of the beneficiary. Mr. Ordean died in 1928 at the age of 72, and a year after the death of Mrs. Ordean, the Ordean Foundation was officially incorporated on December 19, 1933.

The organization began with an endowment $2.1 million – the second largest estate filed in St. Louis County and exceeded only by the Congdon estate. Until the 1960s, the Ordean Foundation functioned as a charity, providing grants to people needing medical care, fuel, food, clothing and other necessities. With the passage of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty legislation establishing public safety net programs, the Ordean Foundation began phasing out direct aid to individuals and began building relationships with agencies that serve low-income residents and families in Duluth and adjacent communities.

Since the early 1970s, the Ordean Foundation has awarded more than $55 million in grants to local nonprofits. Surely Albert and Louise Ordean would be very pleased with the work of the Ordean Foundation, created by his will, and the countless lives impacted by the family legacy.