{"id":180443,"date":"2026-02-26T01:02:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-26T01:02:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/180443\/"},"modified":"2026-02-26T01:02:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T01:02:07","slug":"south-dallas-nonprofit-carries-on-pearl-c-andersons-legacy-of-giving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/180443\/","title":{"rendered":"South Dallas nonprofit carries on Pearl C. Anderson&#8217;s legacy of giving"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a converted liquor store in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/texas\/tag\/dallas\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\">South Dallas<\/a>, Tammy Johnson is serving a little more than food to her neighbors.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We started out addressing food insecurity, but quickly realized when talking to our neighbors, we need to get to the root cause,&#8221; said Johnson, &#8220;and so we do food insecurity as well as addressing the root cause and getting people through our workforce development training programs.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Feeding the hungry and helping people through education. Causes that would have made Pearl C. Anderson proud.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Mrs. Pearl C. Anderson was an amazing individual. Mrs. Pearl came to Texas and really changed what giving looks like,&#8221; said Reo Pruiett, the chief engagement officer with Communities Foundation of Texas.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;She looked around and recognized that her area did not have a grocery store. She borrowed, and she got wood, and she built a grocery store,&#8221; said Johnson.<\/p>\n<p>A historic gift<\/p>\n<p>After building a life and a little wealth with her husband, Dr. J.W. Anderson, in 1955, Mrs. Pearl decided to do even more \u2014 donating a piece of property in downtown Dallas valued at $325,000 to the Dallas Community Chest Trust Fund, now known as Communities Foundation of Texas.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s the equivalent of just under $4 million today.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was amazing for an African American, female to have that money and to be that charitable to give it,&#8221; said Pruiett.<\/p>\n<p>Impact that continues today<\/p>\n<p>Communities Foundation of Texas has been the steward of that gift ever since, donating anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 per year to organizations in need.<\/p>\n<p>Organizations like Empowering the Masses, a small food pantry in a converted liquor store in South Dallas.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;70 years later, we&#8217;re still benefiting from those who saw a need and addressed it,&#8221; said Johnson.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If we could be half as good as Mrs. Pearl C. Anderson, we&#8217;d be knocking out of the park as well,&#8221; said Pruiett.<\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a converted liquor store in South Dallas, Tammy Johnson is serving a little more than food to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":180444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103,430,27],"class_list":["post-180443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news","tag-north-texas","tag-texas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}