Marsh Wallace's nationwide Dining Club helps women in all parts of the world, according to People.
On January 20, 2003, Marsha celebrated her 42nd birthday differently than the usual diner out with family and friends. She wanted her celebration to mean something more and to last a little longer so she invited 25 friends over to her home in Simpsonville, South Carolina. She asked each of her guests to bring a dish to share and $30 to donate to a worthy cause.
"I knew that if we helped only one, it would make a difference," says Wallace. "You never know what the ripple effect will be." Ten years later, Wallace's Dining for Women (DFW) has grown to 425 chapters and 9,200 members around the United States. She has also raised more than $2.78 million to aid women and girls living in poverty in 30 countries.
"I feel compelled to help women," said Wallace, now 52. She is a nurse who was raised by a single mother and was a single mother herself before marrying husband, Jim, a family physician. "I have been a single mother, I wanted to feel self-sufficient, independent and have a sense of achievement. I want them to have the same," she added.
Members of DFW learn about each of the organization's they fund and help and they give grants of up to $50,000 to 21 organizations around the world yearly. Funding efforts like obstetrical care, safe havens and job training for sex-trafficking victims, literacy programs and job training are also their priority.
"In developing countries, women are not only deprived their basic rights. They are brutalized. We work in teams to vet organizations and make a decision to fund, striving for different types of programs that solve different issues in different parts of the world, then we follow-up," said Wallace.
