The Legacy Fund for Boston

The Legacy Fund for Boston (LFB) was established in 2018 with the sole purpose of managing charitable funds for the benefit of the City of Boston and its residents. The principal purpose of LFB is to receive and distribute funds to enhance and preserve the character, sense of community and space, and cultural aspects of the City of Boston, with a particular focus on historic preservation. More specifically, LFB’s efforts would result in Boston’s continued presence as a vibrant, diverse, world-class city that respects, protects, and celebrates its historic resources coincident with enlightened development and change. LFB was incorporated as a public charity in 2022 as it began to receive charitable funds, and made its first grants in 2024.

Mission

The Legacy Fund for Boston is a public charity that supports the endurance of places and spaces that are meaningful to Bostonians and the historic character of the entire city of Boston.

Application Procedure

2026 application information is coming soon, with an anticipated fall 2026 application deadline.

2025 Legacy Fund for Boston Grant Recipients

The Legacy Fund for Boston is a public charity that distributes grant money funds drawn from local real estate mitigation funds for the purpose of preserving and enhancing Boston’s historic spaces. In 2025, the Legacy Fund awarded a total of $140,509 to 11 projects across nine Boston neighborhoods. Read about each project below.

2025 Grant Recipients

Boston Little Saigon - Dorchester

For a year-long educational and cultural preservation initiative honoring the strength and resilience of Vietnamese refugees who resettled in Boston. Through 1975: Preserving Vietnamese Diaspora Histories in Dorchester, community members will be invited to share, reflect, and connect across generations and cultures.

Community Service Care, Inc. - Jamaica Plain

For architectural and structural engineering planning to address critical preservation needs at the Community Care Boston building at 39 Saint John Street, a late 19th-century Queen Anne building in Jamaica Plain that has long served as both a historic fixture and a community resource. Preserving this building will protect a piece of Boston’s architectural heritage while serving as the cornerstone to the Community Care Fellowship, a program that provides affordable housing and structured volunteer placements for students and young professionals.

Friends of the Public Garden, Inc. - Back Bay/Beacon Hill

To update the Boston Common Tree Canopy Plan, to guide the park’s tree succession and canopy renewal. The project aims to fill canopy gaps, restore historic character, and enhance shaded seating in Boston’s most iconic historic park, enhancing the outdoor space for future generations.

Gibson Society, Inc. - Back Bay/Beacon Hill

Funds provided for the planning and design of systems upgrades and an accessibility study at the Gibson House Museum, which focuses on interpreting a century of life in Boston’s Back Bay. The grant will allow the Gibson Society to plan preservation work that protects the house and the museum’s collections while ensuring its stories can be shared with local residents and broader audiences.

Historic Boston Incorporated - Downtown Boston

To support the research and planning for the Unfreedom at the Old Corner Bookstore project, to address critical gaps in public awareness and historical interpretation within the community along the Freedom Trail at the HBI-owned Old Corner Bookstore complex. The initiative will allow HBI to engage local residents, scholars, and visitors in exploring themes of social and cultural unfreedom related to the bookstore’s site, ensuring that the stories embedded there are shared widely and thoughtfully.

Madison Park Development Corporation - Roxbury

Funds provided to support research into the significant contributions of a group of Black activists depicted in the Grove Hall Post Office mural and to document grassroots efforts to beautify a long-neglected corner of the Grove Hall neighborhood.

Old North Illuminated - North End

For the design of accessible seating, including companion seating, for the pew boxes in the Old North Church in Boston’s historic North End. The pew boxes, which contain interpretive panels, are not currently ADA-accessible. Old North Illuminated is a secular, independent nonprofit, and believes this project can produces an innovative solution for accessibility in a more than 300-year-old structure.

Paige Academy - Roxbury

For the completion of a comprehensive Capital Needs Assessment for the historic preservation of Paige Academy’s 26-28 Highland Avenue building. It is a historic building constructed in 1875 located within the Highland Park Architectural Conservation District. The school serves 120 students from Boston families who attend our early childhood, pre-kindergarten, elementary, and summer programs.

South End Historical Society, Inc. - South End

For a preservation assessment of the South End Historical Society’s archives. The society’s mission is to preserve and share the history of Boston’s South End neighborhood by collecting, preserving, and providing access to materials that document the area’s history.

St. Mary's Episcopal Church - Dorchester

For a comprehensive Conditions Assessment and Master Plan for St. Mary’s historic 1888 church and 1907 parish house, to identify structural repair needs and advance long-term preservation and sustainability initiatives across the property. St. Mary’s facilities are important to multiple community groups and organizations throughout the Uphams Corner, Jones Hill, and Dorchester neighborhoods, serving as a meeting place, workspace, and spiritual refuge.

United South End Settlements - South End

For schematic design and design development for the restoration and re-opening of the Children’s Art Centre. United South End Settlements plans to return the building to its original mission – bringing art and cultural enrichment to children and families, regardless of race, ethnicity, or ability to pay.

2024 Legacy Fund for Boston Grant Recipients

In 2024, the Legacy Fund awarded a total of $600,000 to 13 projects across nine Boston neighborhoods.

2024 Grant Recipients

Beacon Hill Friends House, Inc.

Back Bay/Beacon Hill
Funds provided to repair structural pillars at the Beacon Hill Friends House, a center for Quaker learning and action.

Benevolent Fraternity of Unitarian Church

Roxbury
Funds provided to restore the meetinghouse at the Unitarian Universalist (UU) Urban Ministry, a non-sectarian, non-profit social justice organization that has its offices at the historic First Church in Roxbury, a Boston landmark.

Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association of New England

Chinatown
Funds provided to the Chinatown Heritage Center, to improve the physical accessibility at the former Josiah Quincy School. The former Josiah Quincy School was listed in the National Registry of Historic Buildings in 2017 for its contribution to educating immigrant children in the Chinatown community and is the only site in the East coast that is recognized for Chinese-American heritage.

Eliot Congregational Church

Roxbury
Funds provided to help restore Eliot Congregational Church, a historic Boston landmark since its founding in 1834.

Footlight Club

Jamaica Plain
Funds provided to assist in Phase I of restoring Eliot Hall, home to the Footlight Club, America’s oldest community theater. The Footlight Club has produced performances every year since 1877. Eliot Hall is undergoing a long-term renovation as its members and friends in the community return it to its former magnificence and improve safety and comfort for our members and patrons.

Friends of Boston Archaeology

Charlestown
Funds provided to hire a forensic anthropologist as part of the Charlestown 1775 Archaeology Project. Friends of Boston Archaeology is an independent charitable organization dedicated to preserving Boston’s archaeological heritage & sharing it with the public.

Boston Women's Heritage Trail f/b/o Friends of Cedar Grove Cemetery

Dorchester
Funds provided to memorializing the residents of the Home for Aged Colored Women in Boston who are buried at Cedar Grove Cemetery. The Home for Aged Colored Women was an American charitable organization founded in 1860 by a group of abolitionists that provided housing and financial assistance to poor and elderly African American women in Boston. The Friends of Cedar Grove Cemetery is an organization that was established in February 1981 to provide help with improvements for the Cemetery.

Hyde Park Historical Society

Hyde Park
Funds provided to support archival material conservation, and display repairs and upgrades in Weld Hall and Hannan Room at the Hyde Park Library, which was established in 1899. The library’s collection includes a history of the library and a selection of images taken over the years.

Revolutionary Spaces, Inc.

Downtown Boston
Funds provided to the Old State House to help with sub-basement stabilization and water mitigation. Revolutionary Spaces brings people together to explore the American struggle to create and sustain a free society, singularly evoked by Boston’s Old South Meeting House and Old State House. Revolutionary Spaces stewards these buildings as gathering spaces for the open exchange of ideas and the continuing practice of democracy, inspiring all who believe in the power of people to govern themselves.

Second Church in Dorchester Church of the Nazarene

Dorchester
Funds provided to support the third phase of the clock tower restoration and also to pay for high priority roof repairs. The Second Church of Dorchester is a church of the Nazarene in historic Codman Square, a district of Dorchester in Boston. The church was founded in 1804 as the Dorchester Meeting House Company by members from the First Parish Church of Dorchester.

Shirley-Eustis House Association

Roxbury
Funds provided to research past residents of the Shirley-Eustis House stable structures. The Shirley-Eustis House Association exists to preserve, maintain and interpret the Shirley-Eustis House and grounds as a museum for the education and enjoyment of the public. The Association seeks to engage the broadest community in understanding the role of Shirley Place, since its construction as a Royal Governor’s mansion in 1747, as it reflects the beginning of our nation and the history of Roxbury and Boston.

The Friends of Historic Green Street

Jamaica Plain
Funds provided for nominating Historic Green Street (East) commercial corridor for the National Register. Green Street’s history in Jamaica Plain reflects the changes that took place in the community and Boston over the last three quarters of the nineteenth century. Just under a mile long, Green Street was laid out in 1836 by a private speculator and played a key role in Jamaica Plain's commercial and residential development.

Vilna Shul Boston Center for Jewish Culture, Inc.

Back Bay/Beacon Hill
Funds provided for capital restoration, preservation, and rehabilitation of the Vilna Shul History sanctuary and vestibule. Vilna Shul is a cultural center in a historic synagogue building in downtown Boston, whose mission is to spark excitement and curiosity about Jewish culture and the Jewish American immigrant story through vibrant and meaningful experiences.