What would you do if you had billions of dollars at your disposal?

It’s easy to think of many things to buy – a house, car, yacht, and many more. But would you be willing to give it all away to give others a chance to live a better life?

That’s precisely what billionaire Chuck Feeney did.

Chuck was born in the time of the depression in 1931. He was of American and Irish descent, and he grew up as a working-class in New Jersey. With little money, he learned how to work hard to get what he wanted.

He immediately joined the Air Force after high school.

This paved the way for his college education at Cornell University. He worked hard to be the world-class entrepreneur he came to be. With his business knowledge and overseas experience, he found a business that people would patronize.

He built the Duty Free Shoppers.

At first, he sold booze to sailors in the Atlantic Fleet, and it instantly became a hit. He expanded his market to tourists thinking that if the alcohol he’s selling is good enough for the military, then it’s good enough for tourists. He expanded it further to selling perfumes. And the rest was history.

Chuck found himself in tons of wealth.

He built houses and bought properties from all over the world. But it turns out it wasn’t what made him happy. Through time, he grew tired of all his wealth and did not have a sense of purpose. This was when he made the biggest decision in his life.

He left his family with an agreed amount and gave all his money to charity.

He wanted to do something big, something that would help impact the lives of others. That’s when how he started Atlantic Philanthropies. He started in Ireland by helping put up the University of Limerick. And everything just snowballed from there.

After building schools in Ireland, they turned their heads to Vietnam.

They saw how the country badly needs to upgrade and improve its health care system. They did not only build hospitals, but they also addressed the needs of many commune health centers. Atlantic Philanthropies helped over 900 commune health centers, including the training of their health care workers.

But Chuck and Atlantic Philanthropies wasn’t done: their next venture was in South Africa.

They saw how many children wanted to go for higher education but had nowhere to go. And just like what they did to Ireland, they built universities and schools in South Africa. Not only that, but they also supported gay rights and HIV movements in the country that paved the way to make HIV treatment available to their citizens.

After that, Chuck and the rest of Atlantic Philanthropies set a limit for their mission.

Don’t mistake this as an end of their philanthropic world: Chuck just wanted to make sure that he would sustain all those he supported and see the progress of their beneficiaries while he lived. Atlantic Philanthropies gave their last grants in 2016.

As of September last year, Chuck signed off Atlantic Philanthropies with more than $8 billion worth of grants.

Please SHARE this with your friends and family.

Source: atlanticphil YouTube Channel, Atlantic Philanthropies