Helen Gurley Brown Foundation awards Magic Grants

In the spring of 2020, Literature to Life was the recipient of a Magic Grant from the Helen Gurley Brown Foundation - Formerly known as The Pussycat Foundation.  Founded in honor of the late Helen Gurley Brown and named after her favored term of endearment, the Foundation awards grants that align with the mission and values held by Helen as a way of continuing her legacy.  She believed in innovation, education, and the power of books and literacy - as do we.

The grant will be supporting performances in underfunded schools - particularly in NYC - by helping to establish the Wynn Handman Partnership Program, through which schools can apply for subsidy funding and continued multi-year partnership with LTL programming.  The grant will also support some operational costs and allot more employment opportunities for our artists.  

In the Fall of 2020, as the global pandemic seemed poised for a second (and in some places, a third) wave in the U.S., Lit to Life proposed an online approach to our programs by introducing LTL Remote Residencies and LTL Livestream Performances.  We wanted to reach as many students as we possibly could in a time when arts learning is nearly impossible due to the social restrictions brought on by COVD-19. The HGB Foundation awarded LTL an additional grant to specifically fund this endeavor, championing a collaboration effort amongst different organizations to bring remote arts learning to middle school and high school students.  This second grant will be supporting a partnership between Northern Stage Theater in White River Junction (VT) and the Menninger Clinic in Houston (TX), to help bring theatre, arts, and the power of literacy to more students via online means.