Robert F. Sharpe, a Memphis fund-raising consultant, came to the Partnership for Philanthropic Planning’s annual meeting Friday to assure planned-giving officers frustrated by the economy that history does, in fact, repeat itself.

Armed with financial and tax data going back more than 100 years, and old newspaper accounts of donations, Mr. Sharpe demonstrated the ups and down — and ups — of philanthropy over time. Perhaps most heartening: His research shows that by 1937, charitable giving had returned to pre-Depression levels, and had continued to grow from there.

“What I was trying to do is give people confidence that we’ve been through it before and will get through it again,” Mr. Sharpe said in an interview.

He told his audience that during the Depression, like now, outright major gifts had dropped at many organizations, but that bequests and other estate gifts had continued.

Then, like now, he said, donors gravitated toward gifts for endowment and immediate needs, rather than brick-and-mortar projects, and donors were more likely to want to be modest about their giving, shying away from publicity or naming opportunities.

Deferred gifts — the stuff of planned-giving programs — get added attention during economic down cycles, Mr. Sharpe said, and it’s up to fund raisers to help donors choose the right way to give at the right time.

One bright spot already on the horizon, Mr. Sharpe said, is the potential
for gifts of appreciated securities from donors who bought stocks over the
last year when the prices were especially low.

“Last fall when everyone was selling, somebody was buying,” Mr. Sharpe said.
And by early next year, as the market continues to recover, he explained,
those buyers will have newly appreciated property ripe for charitable
contributions.