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Henry P. Davison Award
W.W. Grainger, Inc.
Monday, June 04, 2007 — In times of disaster, the Red Cross relies on partnerships with nonprofit and for-profit organizations to provide relief services. One such partner is W.W. Grainger, the leading broad line supplier of facilities maintenance products in North America.
Grainger, headquartered in Chicago, is the national founding sponsor of "Ready When the Time Comes," an American Red Cross corporate volunteer involvement program that trains employees from partnering corporations and mobilizes them as a community-based volunteer force when disaster strikes. Sixteen Red Cross chapters are piloting the program, which was launched in 2001. By 2009, when the pilot ends, chapters will be working with more than 100 corporate "Ready When the Time Comes" partners with several thousand volunteers in place.
In recognition of Grainger's commitment to community service, the American Red Cross presented the company with the Henry P. Davison Award. Richard Keyser, chairman and chief executive of Grainger, accepted the award, telling his fellow corporate executives in the room, "It's an easy way to unleash the power of your employees and the resources you have at your hands to help in an emergency."
The Davison Award is named in honor of an early Red Cross supporter and leader. In 1917, President Woodrow Wilson created a war council to lead the American Red Cross through World War I and appointed Henry Davison as its chairman. Under Davison's leadership, wartime contributions to the Red Cross reached the extraordinary value of $400 million and Red Cross membership grew to 31 million individuals. After the war, Davison spearheaded a drive to form—and later served as first chairman of—an association of national Red Cross societies to conduct peacetime relief work. Today, this association is known as the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
The American Red Cross helps people prevent, prepare for and respond to emergencies. Last year, almost a million volunteers and 35,000 employees helped victims of almost 75,000 disasters; taught lifesaving skills to millions; and helped U.S. service members separated from their families stay connected. Almost 4 million people gave blood through the Red Cross, the largest supplier of blood and blood products in the United States. The American Red Cross is part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. An average of 91 cents of every dollar the Red Cross spends is invested in humanitarian services and programs. The Red Cross is not a government agency; it relies on donations of time, money, and blood to do its work.
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