Rich man, poor man, happy man
Dreaming the impossible is nothing new to Chuck Feeney ... Neither is making it happen.
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Chuck Feeney was once one of the word's richest men.
Now he’s broke.
And he couldn’t be happier.
He wants to make sure his check to the undertaker bounces. He says any man, no matter how rich, can wear only one pair of shoes at a time. He believes those who have lost most in this financial crisis would never have lost as much if they had given it away to begin with.
Welcome to the world of Chuck Feeney, once one of the world’s richest men who is determined to die one of the poorest. In the process, he has become one of the worlds' greatest philanthropists. Not bad for a raggedy trousered kid from the hard streets of Elizabeth, N.J.
He’s reclusive and elusive, but sitting with him one morning this week in a coffee shop on Third Avenue, he’s just an ordinary soul, a man determined to keep his life as normal as possible and to keep his head while all around are losing theirs.
His foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies, will have given away about $4 billion dollars by the time it spends itself out of existence. Chuck hopes that will be soon, that he lives to see it. "Giving while living" is his mantra.
He has given well over a billion dollars to Ireland, changed the face of higher education there, single-handedly built the University of Limerick, a major linchpin of that city and regions’ economy.
But there are no buildings named after him.
He played a major role in the peace in Northern Ireland, was one of a group of Irish-Americans who went early and convinced Sinn Fein that America, under a new president Bill Clinton, was prepared to get involved. Then, when Sinn Fein went political he personally underwrote their office in America for several years to ensure they had the American presence they needed.
He’s been a trailblazer in other fields, too Long before Warren Buffett and Bill Gates decided to give most of it away while still alive, Chuck Feeney had made that decision. He is quietly very proud he beat them to that.
I’ve known him now for about 20 years. We met first in a dingy coffee shop and he made me foot the bill. He loved my magazine Irish America and wanted to find out all about it - as long as I paid for breakfast.
