Harold Grinspoon

Biography

Born in 1929 in Newton, Massachusetts, Grinspoon grew up alongside his two brothers in a family that struggled economically during the Depression. As a young boy, he was teased for being one of the few Jewish youths in town. The anti-Semitic insults he endured as a child and the subsequent events of World War II left an indelible mark on Grinspoon that would shape his worldview as both an entrepreneur and philanthropist.

In 1978, he met Diane Troderman, a former high school teacher who would become his third wife and partner in a quarter-century of Jewish charitable giving. A battle with tongue cancer in the 1980s had a dramatic impact on Grinspoon and instilled a desire to find meaning beyond profit making. Harold and Diane travel extensively around the world and have published articles on inter-generational philanthropy. Between them they have several awards and honorary degrees, as well as six children and eleven grandchildren.

Business

Grinspoon briefly attended Marlboro College after high school, but left to pursue various entrepreneurial pursuits, including a year selling ice cream. His life changed in the early 1960s when he purchased a dilapidated two-family home in Agawam, Massachusetts with money borrowed from an in-law. He repaired the house, rented it out for a profit, and launched a career in real estate that spanned six decades.

Grinspoon quickly became a key figure in the Western Massachusetts housing market, earning a reputation for buying undervalued apartment buildings in need of repair, fixing them up, and then managing them efficiently. His company, Aspen Square Management, eventually expanded nationally, and by the 1980s had become one of the 50 largest multi-family management companies in the United States. Grinspoon has been quoted as saying that there are no bad times in the real estate business—just "down" cycles when it's a good time to buy, and "up" cycles when it's a good time to sell.

Philanthropy

Grinspoon established the Harold Grinspoon Charitable Foundation, a private family foundation, in 1986. In 1993 he established the Harold Grinspoon Foundation (HGF) in Springfield, Massachusetts with the mission of enhancing Jewish life among young people, adults, and families. HGF’s philosophy is infused with Grinspoon's business acumen: visionary ideas, dynamic partnerships, a focus on return on investment, and attention to constituents’ needs. To date, HGF has invested more than $200 million dollars in Jewish causes and developed successful partnerships with Jewish communal organizations and fellow philanthropists to achieve best results.

Harold credits Dolly Parton for providing the idea that sparked PJ Library, HGF’s flagship Jewish book program. While driving home from the office one day, he heard a radio story about Parton’s efforts to improve childhood literacy rates across the U.S. through her Imagination Library program. He immediately set out to create the Jewish version of Imagination Library.

Launched in 2005 with 200 local subscribers in Springfield, Massachusetts, PJ Library seeks to engage young families raising Jewish children through stories that celebrate Jewish traditions, values, and culture. PJ Library today delivers the gift of free, high-quality children’s books to hundreds of thousands of children in 13 countries, including more than 160,000 children in more than 200 communities across North America. In 2012, Grinspoon received the Jewish Book Council IMPACT Award for his creation of PJ Library and its outreach to the next generation of Jewish youth.

In recent years, Grinspoon and HGF have focused on expanding PJ Library’s impact globally. In 2009, PJ Library launched its sister program in Israel in partnership with fellow philanthropists and the Israeli Ministry of Education. The program, named Sifriyat Pijama, now distributes more than 320,000 books per month to Israeli preschoolers. Another Israeli program, Maktabat al-Fanoos (Lantern Library), delivers more than 92,000 Arab-language books each month to Israeli Arab preschoolers. Together, the two programs have distributed more than 10 million books, a milestone that was celebrated by Israeli President Reuven Rivlin. In recent years PJ Library has launched communities in Australia, Russia, Latin America, and the United Kingdom. All told, PJ Library and its sister programs distribute books in 13 countries and in four languages.

Passionate about the importance of Jewish camp in promoting Jewish values, in 2004 Grinspoon established JCamp180, which works to strengthen the infrastructure of more than 110 Jewish summer camps in North America. HGF incentivizes camp fundraising through challenge grants, which have enabled the camps to raise more than $110 million in matching funds. Most recently, HGF launched LIFE & LEGACY, an incentivized path to help communities secure meaningful after-lifetime legacy gifts for the future of their Jewish communal organizations, and Voices & Visions, a poster series that elicits the power of art to interpret the words of great Jewish thinkers and create opportunities for contemplation and conversation.

In addition to his work with HGF, Grinspoon has served as a founding partner and board member for numerous national and international organizations including Birthright Israel, Hillel International, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), the Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education (PEJE), and the Foundation for Jewish Camp. In May 2015, Grinspoon joined Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates in signing the Giving Pledge, a commitment to dedicate the majority of his wealth to philanthropy.