Russell Sage Foundation

Her greatest single gift was $10,000,000 in 1907^[5] to establish and endow the Russell Sage Foundation. It commissions studies of social issues and recommends solutions.

In 1908 Slocum Sage donated $650,000 to Yale University, enabling the purchase of the Hillhouse property for what was developed as the university's Science Hill. In 1909, Sage donated Holder Hall to Princeton University, named after her Quaker ancestor Christopher Holder. He had been persecuted in colonial Massachusetts for his religion.^{[citation needed]}

Cornell University

Two years later, Sage gave $300,000 to Cornell University for the construction of a women's dormitory, Risley Hall, named after her mother-in-law. Her promotion of women's education also included funding the construction of the Olivia Josselyn House in 1912, named for her grandmother, at Vassar College, a women's college.^{[citation needed]}

Marsh Island

In 1912, Sage acquired Marsh Island in the Gulf of Mexico, dedicating it as a refuge for birds and other wildlife.^{[citation needed]} She gifted the island to the state of Louisiana in 1920, which continued the preservation of habitats and wildlife.^[6]

Russell Sage College

In 1916, Sage founded Russell Sage College in Troy, New York as a comprehensive college for women. The college is located within what has since been designated as the historic district of Troy, an area that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. RSC offers liberal arts and professional degree programs to empower students to become women of influence in their careers and their communities.^{[citation needed]}

Pierson Middle-High School

Financing to build Pierson Middle-High School was gifted by Sage. It was named for her maternal ancestor Abraham Pierson, one of the early European settlers of Long Island. The school was completed in 1908 at the cost of $102,000.^[7][8]

Sag Harbor

Olivia Slocum Sage regularly spent her summers at a house in Sag Harbor, New York, a former whaling and fishing village on eastern Long Island. She organized the effort to build a library in the village, and donated most of the funds. She named the library in honor of her grandfather Major John Jermain, who fought in the American Revolution. The library was designed by Augustus N. Allen; she presented it in 1910 as a gift to the people of the village. The land cost $10,000, and was directly across from Sage's summer home on Main Street.^{[citation needed]}

Olivia Sage's summer residence for many years in the village was later adapted for use as the town's Sag Harbor Whaling Museum. In 2017, in honor of the 100th anniversary of women receiving the right to vote in New York State, the William G. Pomeroy Foundation gained approval for installation of a historic roadside marker outside Sage's former Sag Harbor home to acknowledge her contributions to the suffragist movement.^[9]

Estate

The historian Ruth Crocker has studied how Sage provided in her will for distribution of more wealth: her legacy had fifty-two equal parts. Nineteen named educational institutions received one part, or about $800,000 each.^[2] She made larger bequests to the following of $1.6 million each: the Emma Willard School, the Woman's Hospital, the Children's Aid Society, the Charity Organization Society, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the American Museum of Natural History, and Syracuse University. She also provided large donations in her will to a variety of churches, missions, and other religious causes.^[2]

By her bequest, Sage donated $2,750,000 posthumously for the development of the Russell Sage Foundation Homes in 1919, a suburban community at Forest Hills Gardens, Queens. In addition she gave extensively to the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) and the Emma Willard School, both in Troy. These contributions included funds donated by Sage that supported major improvements on Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's campus: construction of the Russell Sage Dining Hall in 1916, named after Sage's nephew who graduated in 1859; and $1,000,000 for the development of Russell Sage Laboratory. This was the base of Rensselaer's Department of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering.

Sage also contributed to the National Training School in Durham, North Carolina (now North Carolina Central University), founded by James E. Shepard for black teachers and affiliated with the Chautauqua movement. Up to 1915, the sum total of Sage's gifts surpassed $23,000,000.^{[citation needed]}