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The William H. and Camille O. Cosby
Philanthropic Award
 
With the agreement of William H. and Camille O. Cosby, Associated
Black Charities has established The William H. and Camille O. Cosby
Philanthropic Award to recognize philanthropic participation by
an African American or, in selected instances, a non-African American,
who, in any given year, most exemplifies the Cosby's philosophy
or notion of philanthropy in service of improved education and health
and human services to less fortunate African Americans.
The purpose of The William H. and Camille O. Cosby Philanthropic
Award is expected to help focus the need of financially capable
African Americans, in addition to their traditional giving to religious
institutions, to engage in planned, endowment and other forms of
tax advantageous giving.
Associated with The William H. and Camille O. Cosby Philanthropic
Award will be a cash grant to finance a leading-edge, innovative
study or project designed to advance educational progress and understanding
of health and human service issues affecting African American
participation
in American society.
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The first recipient of The William H. and Camille O. Cosby Philanthropic
Award is Willie Gary.
 Willie
Gary's life is truly an authentic American Horatio Alger story --
a rags to riches drama, underpinned by the unshakable notion of
the indispensability of education as the key to personal progress
-- that unfolded onto a national stage from which took place Mr.
Gary's transformation from migrant to multi-millionaire and philanthropist.
One of 11 children born to Turner and Mary Gary in Eastman, Georgia
he was raised in migrant farm communities in Florida, Georgia and
the Carolinas. Mr. Gary leveraged an unwavering desire to be educated
and his all-state caliber football skills to become a legal "Giant
Killer" after graduation from Shaw University in Raleigh, North
Carolina and North Carolina Central University in Durham where he
earned a Juris Doctorate in 1974.
Returning to his migrant roots in Stuart, Florida, Mr. Gary gained
admittance to the Florida Bar and, with his wife Gloria, opened
the first black law firm in Martin County which is now the national
legal services firm of Gary, Williams, Parenti, Finney, Lewis, McManus,
Watson & Sperando.
With the same focused determination and steadfastness of purpose
that stoked his fire for education, Mr. Gary plied his legal skills
in representing little known clients against major corporations
to win some of the biggest jury awards in U.S. legal history. The
financial rewards from his professional work provided Mr. Gary the
means to pursue his deeper humanitarian interests in a more direct
fashion.
With an ingrained sense of the value of education in transforming
one's life for the better, Mr. Gary, recalling his own humble beginnings
and observing the deprivation and the wasting away of the fertile
but undeveloped talent of African American youth, became committed
to enhancing the lives of young children through education.
In pursuit of the goal of providing educational opportunity to African
American youth, Willie and Gloria Gary, with the theme "Education
is Power," contributed $10 million to Shaw University, his
undergraduate alma mater. Additional gifts of $100,000 each to Bethune
Cookman College, Edward Waters College, Florida Memorial College
and Seminary School at Lynchburg followed.
While continuing to build his law practice and businesses that today
include MBC, the Atlanta-based national cable network that is the
first ever 24-hour cable channel devoted to wholesome programming
focused on America's urban viewers, Mr. Gary also expanded his humanitarian
interests and philanthropy with the creation of the Gary Foundation.
In addition to drug prevention, the Gary Foundation provides scholarships
and other assistance to stimulate and promote educational achievement
among African American youth. Mr. Gary has assured the continuation
of interest in philanthropic activity through the active involvement
of his wife, Gloria, and sons Kenneth, Sekou, Ali, and Kobie, in
the Gary Foundation.
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