Windham Fund Awards Grants to 14 Nonprofits with Rural Initiatives

The 2024 grant cycle of the Dr. Paula Windham Fund for Education and Community Development, a fund established at the Community Foundation of Abilene (CFA), has awarded $316,250 to 14 surrounding area nonprofits.

The Windham Fund was established to support special projects, capacity building, and capital projects to build on and ensure a higher quality of life. The Windham Fund allows the Foundation to move rural grantmaking forward, specifically for outlying communities in the greater West-Central Texas region.

Specifically, communities in counties within a 150-mile radius of Oplin, including Brown, Callahan, Coleman, Comanche, Eastland, Fisher, Haskell, Jones, Kent, Knox, Mitchell, Nolan, Runnels, Scurry, Shackelford, Stephens, Stonewall, Taylor, and Throckmorton.

The final list of recipients and their projects can be found in alphabetical order below.

2024 Windham Grant Recipients

1. 89.5 KACU Public Radio – "West Texas Roots" oral history rural engagement program

2. Buffalo Gap Chamber of Commerce – support for Smithsonian traveling exhibit

3. Buffalo Gap Presbyterian Ministries – capital improvements to six cabins

4. Butman Methodist Camp & Retreat Center – capital improvements to Irvine Lodge

5. City of DeLeon – purchase and installation of "Welcome" banners

6. City of Munday – capital improvements to local park

7. Haskell County Hospital District – capital improvements to relocate sleep study program at the rural health clinic

8. Museum of the West Texas Frontier – program support for program coordinator

9. Penatukhah Comanche Trails Partnership – a multi-year grant for tourism plan development

10. Region 14 Education Service Center – support launch of CNA shared instructor state program

11. Stamford Carnegie Library – a multi-year grant toward revitalization project

12. Texas Small Town Young Life – programming support and outreach

13. Imagination Library (United Way of Abilene) – book program that mails free books to children from birth until they begin school

14. XDOT Academy – expansion of culinary education program, including kitchen enhancements

About Dr. Paula Windham

Dr. Windham was a pillar of the Oplin community. She was known to be a trailblazer, a ranch woman, scholar, and woman of faith. Learn more about Dr. Windham and how the fund extends the impact on nonprofit causes beyond Abilene.