John M. Templeton was born Nov. 29, 1912, in the small town of
Winchester, Tennessee. Blessed with parents who encouraged freedom,
the power of prayer, and the exploration of new ideas, Templeton
also acquired the ideals of thrift, discipline, and
self-sufficiency. An exceptional student, John graduated first in
his high school class and was the first in his town to attend
college. And not just any college, either; the teenager set his
sights on one of the most challenging educational institutions in
the country—Yale University. Unfortunately, the Depression took
its toll on the family's finances, so the young man tapped into his
innate entrepreneurial spirit and determination to pay for tuition,
board, and books to complete his college education. Again, his work
ethic and focus paid off. Templeton graduated first in his college
class. He was named a Rhodes scholar to Balliol College at Oxford
from which he graduated with a M.A. degree in law. He married the
former Judith Folk in 1937 and the couple had three children—John,
Anne, and Christopher. She died in February, 1951. He married Irene
Reynolds Butler seven years later on New Year's Eve. She passed away
in 1993 after 35 years of marriage.
As a pioneer in both financial investments and philanthropy, John
Templeton spent a lifetime encouraging open-mindedness. If he
hadn’t sought new paths, he once said, “he would have been
unable to attain so many goals.” The motto that Templeton created
for his Foundation, “How little we know, how eager to learn,”
exemplified his philosophy in the financial markets and his
groundbreaking methods of philanthropy.
Templeton started his Wall Street career in 1937 and went on to
create some of the world’s largest and most successful
international investment funds. Called by Money magazine
“arguably the greatest global stock picker of the century”
(January 1999), he sold the Templeton Funds in 1992 to the Franklin
Group for $440 million.
A naturalized British citizen who lived in Nassau, the Bahamas,
Templeton was created a Knight Bachelor by Queen Elizabeth II in
1987 for his many philanthropic accomplishments, including his
endowment of the former Oxford Centre for Management Studies as a
full college, Templeton College, at the University of Oxford in
1983.
In 1972, he established the world’s largest annual award given
to an individual, the £1,000,000 Templeton Prize, which is
announced in New York and presented in London. The Prize is intended
to recognize exemplary achievement in work related to life's
spiritual dimension. Its monetary value always exceeds that of the
Nobel Prizes—Templeton's way of underscoring his belief that
advances in the spiritual domain are no less important than those in
other areas of human endeavor.
Templeton contributed a sizable amount of his fortune to the John
Templeton Foundation, established in 1987 and based in West
Conshohocken, Pennsylvania. The Foundation currently awards millions
of dollars in annual grants. The Foundation's mission is to serve as
a philanthropic catalyst for research on what scientists and
philosophers call the “Big Questions. ” This vision is derived
from Templeton's belief that rigorous research and cutting-edge
science are at the heart of human progress.
from sirjohntempleton.org
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