With billionaire writer MacKenzie Scott giving report quantities to a number of Traditionally Black Schools and Universities, it begs the query: What’s her connection to the Black neighborhood? In a phrase, Toni Morrison.
As theGrio beforehand reported on a current episode of “TheGrio Weekly,” the late Nobel Peace Prize-winning writer was as soon as Scott’s artistic writing professor and wound up having a big hand within the trajectory of her profession and in the end her life.
Within the early Nineteen Nineties, Scott was an English main at Princeton College, the place she studied artistic writing underneath the literary icon. The “Beloved” author as soon as referred to as Scott “among the best college students I’ve ever had,” praising her self-discipline and storytelling instincts, as reported by The New York Occasions in a 2022 investigation.
After graduating, Scott moved to New York Metropolis, the place she was waitressing and attempting to make it as a author. When she utilized for a job on the hedge fund D.E. Shaw & Co., Morrison apparently referred to as and supplied a glowing suggestion that helped her former scholar land the place. There, Scott met none apart from Jeff Bezos, who was a senior vp on the agency. The 2 started relationship and, after simply three months, had been engaged. Six months later, they married.
In 1994, the couple relocated to Seattle, the place Bezos based an internet bookstore out of their storage, which might quickly change into Amazon. Scott performed a pivotal behind-the-scenes function in these early days, dealing with the corporate’s accounting and operations earlier than stepping again to concentrate on writing. Over the following 25 years, Amazon’s success remodeled the pair into one of many wealthiest {couples} on the planet.
In 2019, the identical 12 months Morrison handed away on the age of 88, Scott and Bezos finalized their divorce. She obtained roughly 25% of his Amazon holdings, valued at round $36 billion on the time, and nearly instantly started giving the cash away. Signing the Giving Pledge that very same 12 months, Scott vowed to donate her fortune “till the protected is empty.”
Since then, she has given billions to organizations centered on fairness, schooling, and racial justice, together with record-breaking items to Traditionally Black Schools and Universities. Amongst them: $80 million to Howard College, $63 million to Morgan State College, $50 million to Virginia State, and tens of tens of millions extra to Spelman Faculty, Clark Atlanta, and Alcorn State.
