Philanthropy
From 1982 until 1997, Alabama held an annual "Alabama June Jam" in Fort Payne, Alabama. Proceeds from these events were distributed to various charities and school organizations and have also been used to set up an escrow account which continues to distribute money to worthy causes. Each of the band members is also active in fundraising for a charity of his choice, and several of them have set up their own charitable foundations.
In honor of their good works, the group has been the recipient of the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award, Country Radio Broadcasters' Humanitarian Award, and the Minnie Pearl Humanitarian Award. They were also the inaugural recipients of the "Spirit of Alabama" medal awarded by Governor Bob Riley.
In their live shows, Alabama often made a point of recognizing the men and women in America's Armed Forces. They have volunteered to visit injured soldiers at military hospitals, and have participated in the "Laying of the Wreath" ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery. For their efforts, they have been awarded the USO Rising Star Award and the Pentagon 9/11 Medallion.
Owen, and his wife Kelly Owen, were the primary benefactors for the construction of the Kelly Owen Women's and Children's Pavilion at DeKalb Regional Medical Center in Fort Payne, which was at the time a charitably-operated hospital of Baptist Health System of Alabama.
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Famous quotes containing the word philanthropy:
“Almost every man we meet requires some civility,—requires to be humored; he has some fame, some talent, some whim of religion or philanthropy in his head that is not to be questioned, and which spoils all conversation with him. But a friend is a sane man who exercises not my ingenuity, but me.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“... the hey-day of a woman’s life is on the shady side of fifty, when the vital forces heretofore expended in other ways are garnered in the brain, when their thoughts and sentiments flow out in broader channels, when philanthropy takes the place of family selfishness, and when from the depths of poverty and suffering the wail of humanity grows as pathetic to their ears as once was the cry of their own children.”
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902)
“I shall not be forward to think him mistaken in his method who quickest succeeds to liberate the slave. I speak for the slave when I say that I prefer the philanthropy of Captain Brown to that philanthropy which neither shoots me nor liberates me.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)