RSSHelen Jewett leaves $14 million to charitable groups in the Valley
Yakima Herald-Republic
Helen Jewett, shown here attending a Yakima Valley Community Foundation lunch in January.
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Helen Jewett's stature as a philanthropist during her life is being enhanced to legendary proportions by what she chose to have done following her death.
In a will admitted to probate in Yakima County Superior Court, Jewett chose to have distributed almost $14 million to Yakima Valley charitable organizations and nonprofit groups.
Including amounts to nieces and nephews, Jewett's estate amounted to $15.5 million.
Jewett, who made the Valley her home in the 1940s, died last month at the age of 94. She had no children.
The recipients are many of the same to which she donated during her life and that of her late husband, Donald Jewett, emphasizing the arts, education, children, recreation and improving the community's quality of life.
Don Jewett died in 1993. He and Helen worked together in his insurance business.
Steve Caffery, chief executive officer of the Capitol Theatre, said Jewett's gifts will live on in the community.
"I think she is a person who will, through her bequests and legacy, change the face of our community," he said. "Helen was a person who, in simplest terms, loved beauty and loved to have fun and loved the theater."
Caffery said the theater plans to use interest from Jewett's gift to support the cost of programming and maintain affordable ticket prices.
The city-owned theater, along with eight other organizations and charities, each will receive $1 million.
They include Wesley United Methodist Church, Memorial Foundation, United Way of Yakima County Foundation, Yakima Area Arboretum, Heritage University of Toppenish, Yakima Valley Museum, Yakima Family YMCA, and the Yakima Symphony.
Her will directs that funds to the YMCA be an endowment to sustain the Helen Jewett Child Development Center on East F Street, for which she financed construction.
As announced three years ago, The Yakima Valley Community Foundation will receive $1.25 million.
In each of the last two years, Jewett gave $50,000 to finance the Youth Advisory Board awards. That $100,000 is in addition to the $1.25 million that will be gifted now, said John Colgan, president of the foundation.
Interest from the $1.25 million will supply the $50,000 needed annually for the awards.
Formed in 2004, the foundation works to improve the cultural, social, economic and educational aspects of life in the Yakima Valley.
Jewett's longtime interest in the Yakima Greenway Foundation will continue with a $500,000 bequest.
"Her fingerprints and those of her husband, Don, are so far-reaching in this community it is staggering to think how many people in the community will benefit because of her," Executive Director Al Brown said.
In addition to the Greenway, other recipients at $500,000 include the Donald and Helen Jewett's President Fund for Excellence at Washington State University, Yakima Valley Community College Foundation, Allied Arts Council of Yakima Valley, and Pacific Northwest University of Health Sciences.
The Yakima Kiwanis Foundation and Yakima Rotary Charities each will receive $250,000, as will the Yakima Valley Chapter of the American Red Cross.
The Young Women's Christian Association, Larson Gallery Guild, and Living Care Retirement Center, where Jewett lived at the end of her life, each received $100,000.
* David Lester can be reached at 577-7674 or dlester@yakimaherald.com.
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