An Army of Normal Folks - Wendy Steele: 100 Women Transforming Their Community (Pt 1)

Episode Date: August 29, 2023

Wendy was frustrated that many women weren’t able to participate in female philanthropy that was usually time-based such as bake sales and events. So one day she dreamt up a whole new world called Impact 100—where 100 women each give $1,000 and together they’d make a transformative gift of $100,000 in their community. Today, there’s Impact 100 chapters in 60 cities and they've collectively given away more than $123 million! Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/premiumSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If I could gather at least a hundred women who each wrote a check for a thousand dollars, a thousand dollars is a stop and think gift. Now I was 38 years old. I myself had never written a check for a thousand dollars to a single charity. I'd never done it. But I figured I could. And I also knew the power of that, that if we could get a hundred women to write a check for a thousand dollars, a hundred percent of it would be pulled in a grant and then offered right back to the local community where these women lived, worked and played. In our very first year when this was just dreamt up,

123 women wrote a check. And we gave away a single grant of $123,000. [♪ Music playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background,

playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background,. I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, a father, an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach in Intercity Memphis. And that last part, it unintentionally led to an Oscar for the film about our team. It's called undefeated. I believe our country's problems will never be solved by a bunch of fancy people and nice suits

talking big words that nobody really understands on CNN and Fox, but rather an army of normal folks us just shouldn't be deciding, hey, I can help. That's what Wendy still, the voice we just heard is done. From this first grant from 123 women in Cincinnati, Wendy's idea that she called Impact 100 has spread like wildfire far more than she could have ever imagined. There's now chapters in 60 cities across four countries and get this, they've collectively given over $123 million through $1,000 check at a time. I cannot wait for you to meet Wendy,

right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. I'm happy you are here. Thanks for, I guess you just got off a plane, didn't you? Yes, sir. Flight was well, not too bumpy. It was all good. That's good. Understand our producer, Alex, picked you up in an Uber.

Yes, he did. That's really impressive. So our producer doesn't even have a car. He's Ubered to get used. That what I understand? Yes, but I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do it. I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do it. I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do it. I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do it. I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do it. I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do it. I'm not sure. That's really impressive. So our producer doesn't even have a car.

He's Ubered to get used. That would understand. Yes, but it was a nice Uber. Oh, no. Thank goodness is a nice Uber. Apparently owning and renting a car escapes Alex. So that's probably another show, an army of normal people who can't drive

or something like that. Anyway, thanks for being here. I'm sorry I had to Uber here. Maybe after this thing sells some advertisements, he can come up with enough money to get a card, actually pick our guest up rather than Ubering. We can dream. That's hope. All right. I guess I got to be fair to produce or Alex. It wasn't exactly his fault.

He bought a new car and after only five weeks, it wouldn't start. And the stupid part that was needed was out of stock, uh, presumably a hangover from the COVID supply chain issues. And the auto dealer wouldn't take his car back because it was after four weeks, which is ridiculous. But, you know, that's big car business for you. And so Alex literally was ubering around picking up our guests. I guess we talk about it on the podcast, but normal people face normal struggles and normal problems. And Alex, the producer is not immune to it. So, Wendy, so much to talk about with you. I've read and listened to a lot of your story,

and I have a bunch of Julian questions, but as you know, it is an army of normal folks. And normal folks seem to identify with normal folks. So tell me about Wendy, the little girl. Where'd you grow up and how'd you grow up and all of those things? What start where you're born and carry me through Wendy the kid? Oh my gosh. Well, I was born in Connecticut. I am the middle of three girls and my parents, my dad worked for a corrugated box company.

When we lived in Connecticut, he was a regional sales manager. My mom stayed home for a while. Probably traveled a lot. He traveled a lot. He got promoted when I was in elementary school. We left Connecticut and moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where so he could be closer to the head office. Yeah. Yeah. So he went from being a regional sales guy to a national sales guy. We moved to St. Louis and that is where I grew up. So how old were you in your sisters

when you moved to St. Louis? Gosh, I was probably in second grade. So seven. Yeah, yeah, seven. Yeah, and your sister? She is four years younger. So she was just a toddler. Three in your older sister?

Three years older. So she was. So yeah, I mean, your dad gets a big promotion, goes to St. Louis, got a three year old, a seven year old, a 10 year old, and living the American dream it sounds like. Yeah, it was. St. Louis is a nice place. You know, it's not that different from Cincinnati in terms of the economics really works. It's beautiful place, lots of rolling hills, but enough corporate headquarters so that people can really make a living there.

Yeah, and the cost of living is not ridiculous like on the coast. Exactly. Either a coast, really. Yeah. It's a lot like Memphis. Since an addy St. Louis, Memphis, a lot of Nashville, not so much.

I think Nashville's cost of living's gone through the roof, but a lot of towns like that. And it is true that a lot of corporate headquarters are there. So your dad's there and your mom was a stay at home mom. She was a stay at home mom. Yeah. Got it. So you grew up with that and I remember I think up through eighth grade you went to the local public school and had a what seemed to be a great childhood and normal family and all of that. That's right. And your mom was an alcoholic. She was. She was a recovering alcoholic for all of my memory. And so a recovering alcoholic is an alcoholic that recognizes she has a disease, but that she's currently not

drinking. So I didn't know her as a drinking alcoholic. That's even the right way to say it. I don't remember her drinking at all. But she had a meetings in the house. She was, I mean, her recovery was very much a part of our daily life. How old was she when you were seven? Oh gosh. So I have to do the math. Yeah. So when I was seven, my dad would have been 37,

which means my mom would have been 35. Then her alcoholism had to predate way appreciated me. Yeah, although later in life, I found out she actually did relapse during our childhood. I just what I mean, the beginning of going to a meeting is in all of that. That must have been so do you think your dad dated her when when she was drinking? Yes. Yeah. Well, I think she quit drinking later in life than when they were dating.

Probably when she started having kids. Yeah. There's a stigma around mental illness, for sure. And I've had people very close to me that struggled with mental illness. And oddly, I feel like, certainly I don't want to brush with a broad brush, but that in a lot of cases, chemical dependency and mental illness seem to go hand in hand.

Did you experience that with your mom? Absolutely. My mom, in addition to being a recovering alcoholic, she suffered from depression. She also had very low self-esteem. An example of how that would surface is if my parents were going to talk about what do you want to do to talk about what what do you want to do on date night or what do you want to do this weekend. And if my mom said I want to go to a movie and my dad said I want to try this new restaurant, my mom would believe that her choice wasn't good enough. And so it would sort of turn into this fight about it not being good enough. And so it would sort of turn into this fight about it. Does it not break your heart for her? Good enough. I know you're too young then.

Her whole view of the world is just heartbreaking because when you understand that you don't feel as worthy as basically anybody else. That's a really hard place to be. Do you think the alcoholism was a function of self-medication at one time? So her inferiority complex and her mental difficulties, but the struggles that she had probably predated the alcoholism and maybe the alcoholism worse her way of self-medicating. That's exactly true.

What she said when she talked about how she started with alcohol is that she was uncomfortable in social situations. She would be uncomfortable going to a party. Now, by contrast, my dad was a guy who never met a stranger. He would talk to me. He was a national sales manager, of course. He was, but like, type A, I'm sure. Very, very, very genuinely a lover of people. Genuinely, remembers everyone's story.

Wonderful at making connections like he was that guy. My mother was beautiful, but she didn't think so and very uncomfortable socially. Now, way before they got together, in order for my mom to go out to go on a date to go to a party to to go to wherever, what she started to realize is if she drank at the event, she relaxed and it became more fun. Until she had to drink before she went out and then she had to drink to Coke. And the cruel irony is I'm sitting here listening to you and I'm by no means a psychologist, but then she realizes she has a problem with alcohol and then she feels even worse about herself. Exactly. So sad, so difficult. And in those days, not only was mental illness

not talking about 70s, when we say those days, those days, I would say at this point, I'm even talking early to middle 70s, people didn't even talk about being an days. Those days, I would say at this point, I'm even talking early to middle 70s, people didn't even talk about being an alcoholic. I mean, if you weren't drinking, somebody would push you and be like, oh, come on, you can have just one. Oh, come on, you know, light up. So it was not easy being a recovering alcoholic

and it also was not easy being somebody who struggled with mental illness and None of it was really talked about publicly. Yeah, it's it definitely a different time so We're certainly gonna get to impact 100 Okay, cuz that is what are the coolest stories in the world and redemptive and largely defines your legacy. And I'm so inspired by what you've done, but to tease a little bit, it's really about the strength of women as much as anything.

I mean, certainly it's about philanthropic endeavors, but the strength of women. And so I'm teasing that for our listeners. And we are going to get to that. But as I was thinking about you and your profile, I couldn't help but wonder if maybe some of your incredible drive to pull off what you've pulled off. Stims from a relationship that you have to have with watching a woman struggle. And I wonder if that plays into it for you at all. Yeah, absolutely it does. There were a couple of things that were happening in my life, even, you know, in these earlier days, one, from a really young age, my parents said to us, not in any formal way, that our job was to leave the world a little better than we found it. And so it would be things like if I was going

down the street to babysit the neighbor kids. I remember my parents saying, look, they're gonna pay you to watch those kids. So when they're napping or when they're playing quietly, I want you to get up and I wanna make sure that the kitchen counters cleaned up, that you tidy, you put toys away, that you wipe down the counters, so that when those parents come home,

they're paying you to watch their children, give them something. So they realize that their home and their kids are better now than when they left the house to go do whatever it is they did. It's a great value. It's a great thing. It's carried with you a whole life and everything you do. My whole life. When you borrow somebody's car, return it with a full tank. Exactly. I'll ask somebody borrow my car once they return it without a full tank. And I'm gonna tell you something. I was like, did your parents raise you right? It was terrible. So for all those listeners, if you borrow a car or or a lawn mower or anything else, return it with full tank. And if you pick up a gas, do it a car, not a new one.

Words to live by. a gas, do it in a car, not an Uber. Words to live by. And now, a few messages from our generous sponsors, but first, I really hope you'll consider signing up to join the Army at normalfogs.us. Guys, I really do believe that this Army can change the country. By signing up, you'll also receive our weekly newsletter that has short episode summaries in case you prefer reading about Army members or celebrating each week, as well as fun and exciting updates about our movement.

Think about it. We'll be right back. You watched your mom who you loved, obviously struggle mightily, and then you turn around and become this strong woman with this woman dominated thing we're gonna talk about and I just I couldn't help but wonder reading it that had to have had some effect on you. What happens when you grow up in a household like that and and when I say like that while my mother was alive, she could be very unpredictable. You don't, you didn't really know what might set her off. And when she got set off, if you will, she would go into her bedroom.

She would keep the curtains low. She had migraine headaches and she would have a migraine headache that she may not come out of her room for days. Really? She would sometimes, and my dad traveled for work, so sometimes my dad would come home on a Friday from a business trip to a note from my mom saying, I had to get away for the weekend. So she wasn't giving us a loan But she was if you have a migraine you get away for the weekend

Yeah, she had to get away now as kids So what would you come home to an empty house? I had to have been That had to have been hard. It was hard. It was hard. I think what ends up happening, well a lot of things end up happening. And by the grace of God, I didn't inherit any of the addictive personality that my mother had. And I, you know, I wish that was something that I did. It wasn't. I'm very fortunate in that regard. But what I did learn in those early years is empathy,

because if as a kid, if I could read how my dad's day was, when he come to him, imagine, he's high pressure, trying to provide for this family, traveling all the time, the corrugated box business as you might imagine is, you know, not a clean, straight road all the time. If I could anticipate what he needed, if I could anticipate what my mom needed, and later I did a lot of the parenting for my little sister. We could keep peace. We could... we could... things would be good. You do realize that's not the

job of a 14, 15, 16, 17 year old. That's hard. It was hard, but it never occurred to me whether it was my job or not. It was just what just what you did It was what needed to happen. Well, that also explains a lot of the help How you are where you are now, which again, we're gonna get to so Sadly your mom took her own life and you didn't even know it Yeah, so that was the summer before my freshman year in high school.

Oh, gosh. And how? Yeah. That's even not the greatest timing for you. No. You're going through all kinds of things. Yeah, I was 14 and everybody at that age is going through all kinds of stuff

and you're dealing with the loss of your mom. Right. Well, what happened at the time? So we were on vacation in northern Michigan. My dad was traveling. My mom was with us. She was an avid bird watcher and a nature lover. And so on this given day, she left and said that she was going to go bird watching and she was going to climb the sand dunes if you've never been to Northern Michigan. They are spectacular. Sand dunes and Michigan. Sand dunes and Michigan that are covered with

the most beautiful pine trees and bushes. And I mean, it how are there sand dunes with pine trees that grow on this? They do. Well, you'll have to come. Apparently, there's birds up there too. Apparently, there are a lot of birds. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, on this given day, she put our dinner in the crock pot. And my dad was coming home from a trip that night. My grandmother, my dad's mother was going to also come for dinner. And she said goodbye. She was leaving. So she drove away in her red station wagon for the day. Well, my dad came in. My grandmother arrived. Mom never came back. But, but you just told me that sometimes your mom would go away for a couple of days. So I guess she didn't really freak out because we did also like, we do not freak out.

Because that's, and past behavior shows that she would do that. So I will, you're absolutely right. Um, and as a kid, I wasn't worried in that moment, for exactly that reason. Now, my dad was worried, but I didn't know it at the time.

And what ended up happening is my dad finally called the police, and the police found her car quite a distance from the sand dune where she was found. Now, my mother was deathly allergic to bees. And so we were told that she had passed away. She was stung by a bee and she had left her epiphen in the car two miles away, or a mile and a half, whatever it was. And once again, because like alcoholism and mental illness, suicide was kind of a hands-off thing you didn't discuss. It was very taboo.

Taboo. For sure. And so, for the children, that was the story. Right. Now, I was 14. Meaning your sister was 17 and 10. Oh gosh, I'm sitting my heart's breaking for your father. Well, and my father was 44 years old. So you think about being in the prime of your

career as a salesperson, providing for the family with three girls. And you have to travel. Who's going to watch my kids? Exactly. It was, yeah, it was unbelievable. The other piece, um, you know, you have something like this happened. Apparently, it was on the news, like the, the police scanner, like apparently people knew how mom really died. Well, you're kidding. People in the neighborhood and stuff. But we didn't know.

Oh my gosh. And I, again, I didn't find out any of this until, until much later. My older sister was, and is a woman who, she's kind of a rebel. She goes her own way. She's that person who like wanted to be a grown-up from the time she was a young, like a toddler. And so when I was in eighth grade, and all of my girlfriends were gonna go

to this all-girls-catholic high school, and I'm not Catholic, my family, know what my family is Catholic, and I tell my parents, I want to go to this all-girls Catholic high school. My parents wanted me to look at other options. And one of those options was a boarding school in the Berkshire's of Massachusetts. Now, I had great friends in the neighborhood. I wanted to go to the Catholic school because that's where they were going. I certainly was not going to go look at basically anything else. Well, my older sister got

a little bit of this. And she's like, wait a second. This is like going to college when I'm still in high school. Bye bye. back to work, and Tina, who was 10, and I were at home. And my dad, that's probably not the right word. I was, I think I was more broken, I was, I think I was more broken than I ever really let myself realize, but I wouldn't have called myself lonely. I've been really blessed to have good friends. And may sometimes not lots of good friends, but like a core group of good friends. A good nucleus of good friends, but like a core group of good friends. A good nucleus of girlfriends. And I also found this interesting community of women who kind of came in and helped out.

Me mean when you were a kid, a community of women from the neighborhood, the school, friends, moms, that kind of thing. After my mom died. So when my mom was still alive, they didn't have very much of a social life because my mom was comfortable. So I didn't see a lot of women come to the house when my mom was alive.

But after she passed, you know, women kind of paid attention. And without being asked without any fanfare, without any organization, sure in the beginning we got cast roles delivered to the door. And we got notes and all that. You have a that ends that ends. These women stuck around. I mean, in the public school, I would have taken the school bus and the the private school, you needed to carpool. And suddenly these moms were saying, gosh, I have a reason to go in that direction.

I want to do extra days of carpool or they would invite you had a community that surrounded you. Yeah. And my dad and my sister, we were very not, you can't say very, but the people who stepped up, they stepped up big. And they did it. Even when it was the other example of what was formative to you. Right. In terms of what you've ended up doing, I have a, did it ever, I mean, is it possible that on those weekends that your mom split that maybe she was falling off the wagon and was trying to get away from everybody with accountability? In hindsight, maybe, although she managed to come back and what I know about that is that it's possible that she fell off the wagon, but for her to be able to stop and then come back.

That'd be tough. Yeah. That feels like maybe not, but I don't know. Bless your mom's heart. She just wasn't comfortable in her own skin. No. No, she wasn't. And your father had to have known that, and he's traveling and doing a big job and trying to raise a family and provide for family and three girls at home And then he deals with the citizen of his wife at 44 years old. I mean, right a lot of Trump. Yeah, he had a lot but you know

He was and again, so my mom died in 1977 in those days dad dads really didn't, didn't parent kids, right? It was really the mom. And dads were not that outspoken. Our dad told us he loved us every single day. He was very emotionally present with us. Which, that's amazing. Is a gift. Yeah, he, I mean, my dad really, he really was amazing. He was not a perfect dad.

He was tough. We had a lot of chores. We had all the things, you know, he was strict. He was all that. But he was authentically a great guy who genuinely loved us and genuinely loved the community. Like he was just that larger than life guy. And he had to put on this tough face when you know he was down inside. Right.

And didn't have anybody who he could really share the world with. Right. He did go to a therapist, I will say. I mean, my dad did get some help. Good. And one of the early conversations after all this happened was, and I wasn't supposed to overhear it,

but my dad was in a conversation with his therapist, his name was Paul. And Paul said, you know, you look at what's happening to these girls, they are at risk. You've got you, you are one of the people. His girl is you guys. Yeah. Yeah. Us. You are lucky that you can bring people around them. You need to pay attention.

And I remember very shortly thereafter, I started to realize like, A, I didn't feel very lucky just to be clear. I didn't feel very fortunate. But I also realized that, you know, I did have people who poured into my life. I did have a dad who genuinely cared. I mean, gosh, he could have, you know, said, I can't do this. I'm done. There are a lot of things that could have happened. And it was in that time frame, you know, within the weeks after my mom passed that I heard frame, you know, within the weeks after my mom passed, that I heard the quote, they are but for the grace of God go I. To this day, in fact, the bracelet I took off says there but for the grace of God go I, it is what grounds me is that, first

of all, yes, this terrible thing happened, but I'm not so naive to believe that I'm the only person who's had a terrible thing happen. I was very fortunate to have my dad's mom and my mom's parents really take an interest in us and really pour into us in significant ways. And so did school and so did the moms. And so I wonder how people would get through it if they didn't have that. And I think the difference between people who are okay, whether that's okay economically, okay with food, secure, with emotional well-being. The difference between those who are okay and those who aren't often isn't what anybody does or didn't do.

It is pure grace. And I was on the receiving end of a lot of it. We'll be right that. Your mom dies and you're entering eighth grade and you're going to a new school, right? And I think I read it was a Catholic school on not Catholic. So, but I have had friends that got to Catholic school and the uniforms and the brothers and the nuns and the rulers on the knuckles and the whole thing you've heard whether or not that's true or not. But tell me about your experience at Catholic school before you went to college. Oh my gosh. So all the bad things about Catholic schools, I experienced none of

that. Now you have to understand that my dad, his idea of the right place to shop for girls clothes was sears. So skins and granemals. Amen. Yes. So you've had a big issue in my closet. My dad left was young, my mom had worked hard but didn't have any money and

hated Tough skills, but because they had this they had this plastic patch on the inside of the knee to keep the knees from wearing out But during the summer when you sweat They were hot. It meant the stupid things would stick to your skin and in the stupid granemals where if you got the shirt, you match it, but that's where we went. And I do remember did the sears you shop that in the very middle of it have a little like snack bar at all. I don't remember that. Are you kidding? If there's a snack bar, I would have been there. Okay, well, ours did. And they had warm

cashews for you could get a bag for a quarter. And the only reason I would go try on toughskins because my mom would cough up a quarter so I could have some warm cash use are so good. Sounds really good. That may have swayed me. But so anyway, you're telling me as a 14, 15 year old girl who's trying to figure it out, wants to be pretty and everything. You're dad and his infinite wisdom is taking you to sears for your pretty clothes. Exactly. Yeah, I see.

So let me tell you, I was probably the only one in that ninth grade class that I was thrilled with those uniforms. Yeah, but you were. Those uniforms were the great equalizer. To this day, I have often said, and my younger sister, and I often talk about granemals, and often talk about, because even when our mom was like,

we got our clothes at Sears, and they were granemals. That's just what your dad said. It was just that's where we were going, because it was good value. Yeah, that's right. Plus add craftsman's tools. Oh, yes. Where else could you buy a wrench

and a pair of jeans and a party dress? Yeah. Perfect. Let's go. All the men in spring. Good time. Yeah. You got that too. We probably did get our free drink. Happy knockoff penny loafers. The world fast regions, but they add them. Because I had to buy the cheek knockoffs too when I came up. I remember all of it. Oh my gosh. So anyway, you know, uniform was fantastic. Because you had a uniform. I knew what to wear. Yeah, yeah.

It was better than granemals. And it was nice. It was structure. I was there with my friends. I felt the most alone in the beginning of my time at the Catholic school. It's called St. Joseph's Academy, so St. Joe. In the beginning of my time at St. Joe, I felt very alone. I was literally the only non-Catholic.

You just lost your mother. And I was the only one who didn't have a mom who was packing lunches, dropping them off at school, picking up after school. You're just under the week. You're doing slumber parties. I mean, it was. And your big sisters often Massachusetts somewhere today. Right.

Right. So I went to my little sister's parent teacher conferences. As the parent. Yeah. I mean, when my dad was out of town, I mean, not as the no one mistook me for the parent, but yeah, I went to represent my dad Unbelievable at those places. That's a big shoe stafil. That's a lot To for a girl going through her own trauma. I mean a kid

You know, I I think in part it was the way I'm wired a lot of it It's not no one ever said to me when I need you to do this and then this and then this. It was just innately how I coped. It was just how I did when I did. Maybe in a small spark what your mom taught you is that you were cleaning the counters. Right. That was what was expected. And so after you put the kid down and their jammies you cleaned the clean the counters to the parents came home and you were acting that out and and later in life. Alright y'all I promise we're about to get to the story of impact 100 and how the idea came to windy while she was a banker in Cincinnati

but we're not gonna do it until we tell one last story about Wendy's family and how her dad met her mom. He was up near Walloon Lake, but in the off season, so none of his summer friends were around. So he went down to the Marina and there's a woman named Esther Simpson who ran the Marina.

My dad used to work for and he popped in. He said, Esther, I'm up here. None of my friends are here. Is there anybody fun? I can anything going on, anything I can do. She said, well, there's a local girl. And her name is Margot. And you should call her up.

And my dad called my mom. So your mom was from there. She was from Pataski, which is the town right next to Walloon. Oh, there. She was there. That was home. That was home. Wow.

She was a local girl. And so they dated, and of course you know the rest of the story. Years later, dad is up on Walloon Lake in the summer. He goes to Esther Simpson. This is about three or four years after mom had passed. He goes to Esther Simpson who's still running the marina on the lake. And he says, oh, Esther, my friends are all giving me

a hard time. I'm supposed to bring a date to the country club dance. You're not going to tell me. And she says, you really ought to look up Cynthia Bedale. And dad said, are you kidding me? Exactly. He married her. Oh my God. He married her.

If it wasn't for Esther Simpson, your dad man never had a date. Ever. At least not a good one. Yes, Simpson. Yeah, when she passed, we all teased my dad like, okay, you better make this work, that'll be. Yeah, it's not working. You're screwed. You're never going to get another date.

It's over. That is a hilarious story. Yeah. Unbelievable. They were married in I think 1984 and Sinny is is what she goes by. She's my stepmom and amazing. She's still living my dad's been gone for about 10 years, but yeah, happily ever after. So it's a crazy story. So sorry, that was a way off, but well worth the story. That's hilarious. So now we're going to get to

your philanthropy. And tell me this story. I think it's great about, you heard a story once about how I'm just going to say it candidly and I'll let you unfold it so people don't think I'm just going to say it candidly, and I'll let you unfold it so people don't think I'm a misogynistic jerk. How you found out that men were better fundraisers than women, and you wanted to fix that. So tell us that. Because you've made a farce out of that misnomer, but I think it kind of sparked you. So tell me about it. It did. It was definitely a part of the story.

I had heard a story about a church that had gotten in financial trouble. And so the lead pastor called in the senior staff and they called in the head of the men's guild and the head of the women's guild and laid out the problem. And they needed to raise a lot of money really quickly. So the senior staff went out and they collected receivables. they tried to get extended payments, they did everything they could to cut costs to sell things to downplay. The head of the women's guild went out and she gathered her team. In my word, they had bake sales, they had car washes, they had rummage sales.

They worked and in two weeks, she had the money. Needle point. Because they were doing it out. All of the stereotypical women thing to do, right? Go out and raise money. This is what we're going to do. We're going to work our fingers to the bone and do all these cool things and bake cookies and have a...

And they all did it. They were all in all these women and they worked harder than they have out. Ever done. Yeah, working hard. She was so proud to deliver this big check to the pastor. Of. I think it was $8,000. It's a lot of money. Which did three weeks. A lot of money. A lot of work. Well, that's a lot of bacon. A bad is a lot of bacon. Yeah. Well, as she's getting ready to walk out, the head of the men's skilled walks in, and she's curious, feeling probably cocky and a little competitive.

Yeah, sure, why not? Sure, they worked their tails off. Well, he handed a check to the pastor that was many times more than what she did. Like a number. Like 25 grand? Like a lot of money. And she said,

Ego killer. I don't get it. I don't get it. How is this possible? In the guy- None of you guys cooked a bag. Exactly. I haven't seen you lift a finger in a-

Did what Alia, we been working our butts off. What'd you do? We were 25. How did you do this? Yeah. Did what Ali, yeah, we've been working our butts off. What'd you do for your 25-year-old dude? How did you do this? And he said, well, I thought about what I thought my family could give and I wrote that check. And then I called my friends and I saw Joe on the golf course

and I saw so and so here. And my friends are generous and they believe in the church. And so that's how I did it. And what struck me about that is that the women, it wasn't just one, this whole group of women, they all knew the situation. Not one of them thought, maybe I can write a check. Now one of them thought that. They all thought we've got to roll up our sleeves and we've got to find a way to make something from nothing. And the men had an entirely different view. Now, my banking background

tells me that it was only in the middle 70s that women could do anything outside the home in a meaningful way, but it was like 1984 that women could own their own credit card without having a father, a brother or a husband. Are you serious? You're telling me, and up until 1984, a woman could not have her own credit card. Oh, or a single, what about a single married woman? She could not get bank credit. It was you kidding me. It took a law to change that in 1984. A federal law. A banking regulation is, I guess, hold it.

Now, see, this is what I said. I mean, this is not in my notes. So you're telling me in 1983 when I was a Toughboard high school my mom Couldn't get a credit card unless her father co-sign so

Don't hold me to the exact day. I can tell you this, she couldn't get alone if she wanted to start a lumber company or if she wanted to start a dry cleaning business or if she wanted to fill in the blank, she was typically unable to get any kind of credit unless it was co-signed by a husband, a brother, a father, by a man. So I looked it up after the interview

and what Wendy was saying is absolutely true. And even shocking to me, until the Equal Credit Opportunity Act was signed in the law in 1974, when I talk in 1920 here, 1974, banks could refuse to issue women a credit card if they were applying for it on their own without a man co-signing for it. I know you know. I am flabbergasted at that. You had women who now we were able to work outside the home and we were making our own money.

And starting to do that. And we were able to do that. But when you look at how philanthropy started in this country and everywhere. Men went off and worked every day. Women stayed home and took care of the kids. And when the kids were old enough to be in school for a little while, women had free time. And the way they used their free time other than cleaning the house and doing all the things that women did, is they would go out and serve the community. They would go and volunteer. They would help each other. They would have all the circles. And they would do all of that. Well, you know, I have to interrupt you.

I'm going to tee this up for you and let you work on it, okay? Okay. Some would say that was a better time. Oh gosh. I would not say that that was a better time. Unfold it. Here's the thing. There are women for whom that option is ideal. And so I believe when we get too prescriptive about what a quote real woman might be or not be, then I think there are women who ought to be able to choose that path and thrive and enjoy it and not be judged for it. I

also think that there are plenty of women who would choose another option. So I believe that until all women can live there to their fullest potential, we're at whatever path. Right. We are short-changing society because what I can tell you is better decisions are made when you have multiple lived experiences and so I'm not gonna ask you this and you can feel free to cut all of this out of whatever goes bad. But I don't know how many women you have working with you but if you have all

white men of a certain age whatever your your age, I think you said you're in your mid-50s, if you have a bunch of 50-year-old white men making all the decisions, you are likely missing part of the story because women who have different lived experiences bring different perspectives. And so when, and frankly, although everything we've talked about is how great women can be to each other, unfortunately, sometimes women are not great to each other. And sometimes it's women fighting women.

Like, gosh, you shouldn't work outside the home. Or you, you know, you should work outside the home. My stance on this is each of us come with our own unique gifts. We have to make sure that society, that the economy, that the places we live, work and play allow women to be who they were born to be. Whether that is to go be an engineer or to be a stayed home mom or to be a teacher or a physician or a scientist or fill in the blank. We need to do that in the same way that we need to allow men to be exactly who they were born to be. Whether that's stay home and raise kids, be a nurse, be a teacher, be an

engineer, be a nut. So you're saying there's gender stereotypes that existed in the 70s and 80s that were rightly broken in our society, but we still have a long way to go. Exactly. Okay, so back to your story. The guys made a few phone calls, wrote a check, and raised 25 grand.

The women worked at butts off for three weeks and raised eight. And the difference was that the cultural norm of the time was that a man could write a check and a woman couldn't. Right. Now see, I find that interesting. And it wasn't make no mistake. There was no man, at least none that I've ever heard of. There were no men ever saying to women,

don't you write that check? No, I wasn't that. It was a cultural mindset. It was inherent. And so the old ways of women being involved in the community, it was all time-based because that was the asset they had. I get it. But not anymore.

I get it. But not anymore. We'll be right back. So, Wendy, you decided that you wanted to surround yourself with some check right in women. Tell me about it. What I knew is that so when I moved to Cincinnati, I got involved in the community in a big way because I didn't know anyone and that's how I met people. I was finding women who would tell me all the reasons why they couldn't be involved in the community and the ways that I was trying to bring them in. So I was doing some work for a local zoo at one point and for a local hospital and another.

And we were either putting on a gala because that's the way we raise money or we were working on another campaign to help raise money for the Garden Civic Garden Club and others. And the women, even if they were interested in what I was doing, they had reasons that they said they couldn't do it. They would say, well, I can't really justify to pay a sitter $10 an hour because I'm going to stay at home mom so that I can go volunteer with you. Or they would say, I work for Proctor and Gamble, I travel all the time, I can't go to these regular meetings. In my world, I was still a private banker, but every bank I'd ever worked for, valued community service.

I never had to take a vacation day to go serve my community. I never had to take time off to serve on a board of a nonprofit. And that was my discernment in a future employer. I hear that and I think about the mom who says, I really can't afford, I don't think it's right to pay a sitter so that I can go because the amount of money they're paying a sitter is probably not really the deterrent. But it feels like it. Oh, understand. But that is also to me, cultural, and even maybe touches paternalism a little. I think you're right.

I think that there are lots of negotiations that happen in families when women choose to stay home, that it's, you know, they may be on a budget. I mean, it wreaks a barefoot and pregnant to me. It just does. Yeah, and I don't know that the stay-at-home moms would necessarily feel that way. Well, I'm just saying that at a particular instance, you can absolutely feel that.

Yeah, absolutely. Cultural barrier, I guess, for some folks. Definitely. And so you saw that and wanted to break through. I did. And during my time when my kids were little, there were times in my life where I was a full time stay at home mom, where I worked part time or when I worked full time. But because community service was always very important to me. When we built the budget of can I stay home, there was a component

of community service. There was a component of me not staying home all day every day, but getting help, you know, help with kids, maybe help even sometimes with cleaning, but the idea was it's negotiated like on the front end, but you have to know what you need in order to do the math, right? Got it. So that's what was happening. And 90% of what women were involved in was time-based. And when you don't have time, you can't participate. And that's how you raise the $25,000 the men do when it's time based. And you're squeezing every little time you can out between a job, children, whatever. Exactly. So, so it's time to change that.

Now, I sat with this spiral notebook of every objection I'd heard and I started just figuring it out. That's funny. And as a banker, I knew the part of the equation was women had to give enough to remember it. Now, remember, in these days, there were workplace campaigns and you would give pre-tax and therefore you wouldn't feel it. And what I know to be true and new then is that it's important as a donor to be connected to the gift. If you take it out of my paycheck and I never missed it, I likely won't feel connected to the organization that it's

going to. So if I leave my place of employment and my new job doesn't do that same thing, I don't necessarily have an affinity that pretext take it out of my check to almost feels like I'm checking a box to make myself feel good, but not because I'm truly engaging in a philanthropic endeavor in my heart. Yeah. Well, and you can't really get connected because you don't see it. Right. And it's just like being connected to your other taxes that get pulled out and you're, you know, whatever goes into your IRA, like those things, they just go away. Right.

And your day-to-day thought is about what you live on. So my theory was if I could gather at least a hundred women who each wrote a check for a thousand dollars, a thousand dollars is a stop-and-think gift. Now, I was 38 years old. I myself had never written a check for a thousand dollars to a single charity. I'd never done it. But I figured I could. And I also knew the power of that, that if we could get a hundred women to write a check for a thousand dollars, pull a hundred percent of it. So there be no talk of, you know, what percent is going to this and what percent is going to that. The 100% would be pulled in a grant and then offered right back to the local community where these women lived worked and played. The nonprofits would then apply for those grants if women wanted to understand the process.

If they wanted to get involved, they would be trained how to read a grant application, how to make a site visit. Ultimately, we would through our membership identify five finalists one in each focus area. So we would be women giving to community, not necessarily women funding women and girls. And so these women given communities the way the men at the Catholic Church did not by having a bake off. Exactly. And isn't there ironically some kind of power in that? A huge power, huge power. Once you have

written that check for a thousand dollars, huge power. Once you have written that check for $1,000, your worldview starts to change. Right. But it also, it really changes when you're giving away, and in our very first year when this was just dreamt up, a 123 women wrote a check and we gave away a single grant of 123 thousand dollars. This is after fielding over a hundred grant applications. Wow. And then we identified five finalists one in each of the categories. Educators. And these categories

haven't changed. No, they haven't changed. By the way, what year are we talking? We're talking 20 something. 2021. It's this year. This summer of 2001, I had the idea. And we, so that was summer, 9-11 happened. So everything really changed.

At the end of October, we met as a board for the first time to say, are we going to do this or not do this? We decide to go ahead. We got our non-profit status 501c3 by March of 02 by May 123 women at hand at us a check. We couldn't take credit cards like it was literally a paper check. We got about 112 or 114 grant applications across the five focus areas are education, environment, health and wellness, arts and culture and family. When all those five areas are, say those again, education, environment, arts and culture, help them wellness and family. So you got five grants, five, you got five of these five categories and a hundred people applying for this 123 grand. Yep. How do you decide who gets it? The women who joined, they signed up to

serve on one of these focusary committees. When the nonprofits applied, they applied to one of these committees. Oh, the 123 checkwriting women are on each one of these committees and each committee has a committee chair. Exactly. So the idea is part of what impact 100 does

is it democratizes philanthropy. So today, and then, That's cool. It democratizes philanthropy. Well, if you can write a really big check to let's just say the art museum, you can write a really big check to the art museum. You can tell them what to name the exhibit, you can tell them what art is allowed to be brought in. I understand what you're saying now. You might even be able to design the architecture of the room.

If I write a check for $1,000, I'll get a tax letter. I might be listed in the C of names of givers, maybe in their annual report or on their website. I won't know when they spend the money. I won't know when they spend the money. I don't know how they spend the money. And if I ask, I'll probably just hear crickets. Like they aren't equipped to tell me what happens. Now, if in partnership with 122 other women,

we decide where the money goes. And so if a woman has the time and the interest, she will learn how to read an application, how to vet it, how to do a site visit. But if she doesn't have the time, it's still one woman, one donation, one vote. So if someone's wealthy enough to write a check for $5,000, so that by five votes. So you're telling me that first time there's 123 votes and you tell it them up? Yes. That is so cool.

It was really cool. All of it went to one cause. Yeah. Phenomenal. Because the other thing that I learned, so I knew what women needed, but I also knew what the nonprofit world needed. And if you talk to anyone running a nonprofit today, fundraisers, they're out asking for money all the time.

And when they get it, they get 10,000 here and 15,000 there. It's wonderful. It does move the needle a little bit. But it's a lot like that move the needle a little bit. But it's a lot like that, Manna, from Heaven. You have it today, but tomorrow you better be out there again, gathering because... But 123 grand is a real number. Now it's a game changer. Now they can really do something that is sustainable and transformational.

Those are the lenses we look at. And that concludes part one of my conversation with Wendy Steele and I hope you'll listen to part two that's now available. The Impact 100 story is really just getting started. And Gazette, I really wanna take a moment to stress one thing. While giving a $1,000 sounds like a lot, and I mean it is, it's a lot of money for most of us.

Maybe if you step back and put it in context, it becomes more achievable. If you take $1,000 and divide it by 365 days in the year, that's $2.73 a day. Y'all, that's less than a cup of coffee at Starbucks. And if you consider what that $2.73 a day has done for all the people throughout the organization, maybe that context helps you think about how much a thousand dollars is and really how much it isn't. And the impact of this type of gift upon ourselves is way more than that dollar amount could ever account for. Guys I'll see you in part two.

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