When Peter Martin Wege moved to Grand Rapids to open his own metal-furniture business in 1912, he could not have imagined Metal Office Furniture—started on a $75,000 bank loan—would become Steelcase, the world’s largest office-furniture company. Wege’s experience as a metal fabricator himself created the workplace culture that continues a century later. Peter Martin knew the success of his new business depended on his employees, and he made sure to treat them well and pay them well. If his company was to prosper, he wanted his employees to do so as well.
When his son Peter M. Wege went to work for Steelcase, he, too, left a permanent mark on the company’s culture based on an airplane ride. During World War II Peter M. Wege flew for the Army Air Force; one sunny day trying to land in Pittsburgh, the smog was so thick he couldn’t see the ground. From that day in the cockpit on, for the rest of his life Peter M. Wege devoted his time, energy, and financial resources to cleaning up and protecting the environment.
And he started at his father’s company. Peter M. Wege’s influence on Steelcase led to the company’s becoming a pioneer in environmental manufacturing from biodegradable paints to ergonomically clean air to protecting furniture with reusable blankets instead of boxes. In 2001, Steelcase built the world’s first industrial manufacturing plant to receive LEED Certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.
Peter Martin Wege died in 1947 and Peter M. Wege in 2014. But Steelcase’s attached report confirms that their legacies live on. Titled appropriately Sustainability, it highlights the company’s triple-bottom-line mission to make profits, protect the environment, and promote positive social change. Peter Martin and his son Peter M. Wege had a lot to do with this
Ellen Satterlee leaves the role she has played for 25 years as CEO of The Wege Foundation and now takes a seat as a Trustee of The Foundation. This in-depth interview with Rachel Hood, Executive Director of the West Michigan Environmental Action Council, eloquently shares some of what this soft-spoken woman and Peter Wege accomplished as a team doing “all the good” they could just “as often” as they could.
And I do consider you friends—of mine and certainly of Peter’s and of The Wege Foundation’s! Some of you know I am retiring as CEO of The Foundation Peter started in 1967 and where my career and heart have been ever since. For those who don’t, I am writing to tell you myself so you don’t find out in the newspaper. Each of you reading this has done what Peter so believed in: collaborated with The Foundation and with me personally. I don’t think I can fully express what your involvement has meant to me as it did to Peter. Who hasn’t heard me say, “How did I get so lucky to have this job?”
What a privilege it was for me to work as Peter’s right hand for 21 years until he died last summer. In an interview for the book being written for the 50th anniversary of The Wege Foundation, I was asked to reflect on those years.
It is overwhelming when you see how very generous Peter Wege has been over the years. For a long time I have said that I was probably the only one who really had any idea because I saw both sides—Foundation and personal. I don’t even think he realizes the extent because he really doesn’t keep track—he just does the next right thing.
What I said then is just what I’d say again today—except, sadly, in the past tense. But now The Wege Foundation carries on for Peter ‘doing all the good it can.’
Finally, it is my honor to tell you that the Foundation Trustees have invited me to join them on the board! So I am not really going anywhere. Now my only question is, “How did I get so lucky to be named a Trustee?”
All the Best,
Ellen
In Photo: Ellen Satterlee on the right with Dr. Miranda, University of Michigan’s Dean of the School of Natural Resources & Environment, following Dr. Miranda’s delivery of the annual Peter M. Wege Lecture on the environment at U of M.
September 3, 2015; Grand Rapids, MI – The Wege Foundation announced today the retirement of Ellen Satterlee as President and CEO, effective October 30, 2015. Satterlee will continue to serve as a member of the Foundation’s Board of Trustees.
“Ellen has provided stellar service to the Wege Foundation since 1988, including as CEO in leading the generational succession from our founder, Peter M. Wege,” said Peter Wege II, Chair of the Board of Trustees. “We wish her well in her retirement and are grateful we will continue to benefit from her knowledge and wisdom as a Foundation Trustee.”
A graduate of Aquinas College, Ellen Satterlee served ten years on the Aquinas College Board of Trustees. “Ellen’s dedication to service embodies all that Aquinas College stands for,” said Aquinas College President, Juan Olivarez, Ph.D. “Aquinas was proud to recognize Ellen’s leadership with an Honorary Doctor of Public Policy degree in 2013.”
Satterlee also served on several other boards and committees, including on the Grand Rapid Symphony Board and as a member of the Grand Rapids Economic Club. “Ellen is a close colleague and has been a key partner in many important philanthropic projects,” said Diana Sieger, President of Grand Rapids Community Foundation.
“Ellen’s work with Peter M. Wege over so many years has helped make Grand Rapids a global leader in sustainability – or, in ‘Economicology,’ to use a word coined by Peter Wege,” said Grand Rapids Mayor George Heartwell.
“Working for Peter Wege, The Wege Foundation and the Wege family has been an amazing journey,” said Satterlee. “To watch the Foundation evolve to fulfill Peter’s vision for a better world has been a blessing and an honor.”
The Wege Foundation was launched in 1967 and for nearly 50 years has supported worthy organizations working in five thematic areas, or “pillars:” Education, Environment, Arts & Culture, Health Care, and Human Services. Focused on the Grand Rapids metropolitan area, the
Foundation embodies Peter M. Wege’s life-long philosophy: “Do all the good you can, in all the ways you can, for all the people you can, for as long as you can.”
In Photo: Mark Van Putten, Ellen Satterlee, and Congressman Vern Ehlers are shown in Washington D.C. in 2008 when the late Peter M. Wege and The Wege Foundation launched Healing Our Waters to save the Great Lakes. Congressman Ehlers sponsored the bill that led to $20 billion in federal funding to preserve and protect the Lakes. Mark Van Putten, a longtime consultant to The Foundation, will succeed Ellen Satterlee as the Foundation’s CEO October 31 when she retires after 21 years.
In July 2015, Wealthy Theatre again made history by converting all its lighting to LED making it the first restored theatre in the world to achieve this 90 percent energy-saving status. This LED gift from The Wege Foundation includes a new roof with additional solar panels above the Peter Wege Auditorium and a new solar/LED lamp in the Sigsbee Street parking lot behind the Theatre. That lamp is especially important to the neighborhood as it’s the main source of light for that section of Sigsbee Street.
The shining new additional solar panels on the Theatre’s roof can be seen by the Theatre’s Baxter neighbors as the sun hits them providing enough free power to run all the stage lights. Theatre Director Erin Wilson called the LED/solar lighting of the Peter Wege Auditorium “a fitting tribute to the great man after whom it is named.”
It was Peter Wege who helped make the first “history” happen at Wealthy in 1998 when he helped save it from the wrecking ball after 25 years of vacancy and vandalism. Wealthy Theatre had once been that business district’s main attraction with its own streetcar stop; but by the 1990s, it was the center of a crime district.
Built in 1911, the ornate theater was originally named the Pastime Vaudette with live entertainment and silent movies. But it opened just as vaudeville died out. During World War I, the elegant Theatre’s large spaces were filled with equipment for the Michigan Aircraft Company.
In 1920, it reopened as Wealthy Theatre owned by Oscar and Lillian Varneau, parents of Peter Wege’s best friend Gordy, Peter’s second family.
Peter Wege has great memories growing up watching Westerns with Gordy at Wealthy Theatre where the boys ushered moviegoers to their seats earning 25 cents an hour. Gordy’s parents Oscar and Lillian spent many Saturday nights playing cards with Peter’s parents.
After World War II, the flight to the suburbs and the onset of television forced the Theatre to close its doors in 1973. Over the next 15 years, the boarded-up eyesore became a public hazard where, as one city commissioner told the Press, “druglords and gangs ruled the area.” In 1989, the city of Grand Rapids voted to demolish Wealthy Theatre.
That’s when the area’s concerned residents and business owners stepped in forming the non-profit South East Economic Development to protect their neighborhood. Knowing that razing the theatre would further damage their once vibrant business district, the SEED folks convinced the city to declare Wealthy Theatre a designated historic landmark and sell it to them for $1.
SEED realized it would take millions to repair the damage from decades of neglect. They turned to their best hope knowing Peter Wege to be an ardent environmentalist who believed in restoring, not destroying. What SEED didn’t yet know was Wege’s strong personal history with the Theatre. For Wege, Wealthy Theatre meant Gordy Varneau and his family.
Peter Wege led the charge to raise the $2.2 million needed for restoration. And in 1997, the Wealthy Theatre reopened as a performing arts center. For Wege, the highlight of the occasion was having his friend Gordon Varneau fly in from Las Vegas to join the dedication.
The accompanying video of the transformation from decay to renewal includes a picture of the entrance floor mosaic that Peter insisted must be saved. The white stone letters spell VARNEAU.
Ellen Satterlee, CEO of The Wege Foundation, Katy Furtado, Administrative Assistant, and CFO Jody Price honoring the name above them and celebrating The Foundation’s gift of LED lighting to Wealthy Theatre.This bright mural decorates the Community Media Center building, another gift from Peter Wege and The Wege Foundation, next door to Wealthy Theatre.
After 20 years with the Wege Foundation, Terri McCarthy, Vice President of Programs, retired at the end of May, 2015. Over the course of her career with the foundation, Terri played an integral role in many successful philanthropic efforts. Now Terri wants to thank the people who allowed so many programs and funding partners to grow and prosper during her tenure. As she puts it, “It is difficult for me to leave behind the great work, relationships, and achievements The Wege Foundation has allowed me to be a part of over the last two decades.
Before Terri retired, The Wege Foundation trustees implemented a matching gift program for Wege Foundation team members. Terri was honored to take part in the new program with The Foundation matching donations she made before she left.
One of Terri’s farewell gifts matched by The Wege Foundation went to the Guanacaste Dry Forest Conservation Fund to convert an old farmhouse into a biological station on newly acquired property being added to the ACG, Area of Concervacion de Guanacaste in Costa Rica. Fluttering nearby are the three species of butterflies Dan Janzen discovered and named for Peter Wege, Ellen Satterlee, and Terri: the Porphyrogenes peterwegei, the Anacrusis ellensatterleeae, and the Anacrusis terrimccarthya.
Terri is deeply grateful to Dan Janzen, his wife Winnie Hallwachs, and the faithful supporters of the GDFCF for conserving the wildlands where these namesake butterflies now live. Terri, however, worries about their future because global climate change is heating the lowlands forcing all species, including insects, to move to higher elevations seeking cooler and wetter territory. But at the mountain tops, they can’t go any higher and will cease to exist as many species already have.
Even more than usual, Terri is looking forward to her next visit to the home she and her husband Steve have in Costa Rica because she can visit the renovated research station and the newly acquired property.
Other programs Terri took to heart were the Blandford Nature Center, Grand Rapids Public Schools Blandford School, the Center for Economicology and City High/Middle School. As a former high school science teacher, Terri understood the importance of environmental education and global-resource awareness. She subscribed to the same belief that Mr. Wege repeated often, “Get them outside when they are little so they understand the planet that supports us.” For Terri, another matching contribution to the construction for a new Blandford Nature Center Visitors Building was a natural.
Terri wishes she could list every single one of the wonderful people who have supported her over the years. She especially wants to thank Ellen Satterlee – CEO, the heart and soul of the foundation since 1987; there are not enough words to thank Ellen for her patience and confidence in our team including CFO Jody Price, Editor Susan Lovell, Administrative Assistant Kati Furtado. She also thanks Mark Van Putten for his national water-policy expertise and relationships that put the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative on the national agenda. And, of course, the board of trustees and next generation of the Wege Foundation who will breathe new life into their father’s and grandfather’s mission to “save the planet.”
But above all, Terri thanks and honors Mr. Wege,who had the vision, strength and humor to lead the way by planting the seeds of Economicology around the world!
*Pictured above: Ellen and Terri with Peter M. Wege at the University of Michigan in 2007 where he was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree.
Jack Hanna, Director Emeritus Columbus Zoo and TV star as Jungle Jack, with Terri at a National Wildlife Federation meeting.Terri with Jody Price, CFO of the Wege Foundation.Working partners and close friends, Ellen and Terri.
The ongoing news stories on our country’s unemployment numbers identify a serious economic concern. And while there are many reasons people can’t get jobs, those most handicapped are the men and women newly released from jail or alcohol/drug rehabs. The fact that they’ve paid their debt to society in the first group, and, in the second, chosen the tough road of treatment to stay clean and sober matters not to employers. They read “jail” or “alcohol/drug rehab” on a job application and move on to the next candidate.
And for good reason! These are high-risk employees who have either broken the law, succumbed to alcohol/drugs, or, in many cases, done both. But eight years ago successful business owner Scott Jonkhoff decided somebody had to give these men a chance to prove themselves. He bought two houses on Hall and Division and hired three of these ‘newly released’ men to renovate it.
The next year, 2008, Scott’s dream of helping more men reach the “next step” in their lives became a 501-C 3 non-profit he named for that mission. “I started Next Step,” Jonkhoff said, “because men kept coming to me who needed work and an opportunity to prove themselves. There is a tremendous amount of talent, potential, and energy sitting behind bars, and, yes, there is a stigma. Yes, our guys have made some mistakes and screwed up. But so have you and I. If we could put a fraction of the amount of resources into helping, versus the cost of warehousing ex-offenders, I believe those actions would begin to reverse some of our stigmas.”
In 2009 the City of Grand Rapids hired Next Step to do six full remodel projects and Scott hired more jobless men. By 2010, Next Step had ten men on the payroll, a budget of $775,000, and had built a reputation for quality work coming in on time and under budget. By 2012, Next Step had completed over fifty jobs.
Their expanding services—construction/reconstruction, landscape/lawn, demolition, custom woodworking and furniture—now require more space. When asked to support Next Step’s current $1.4 million campaign to buy and restore the vacant Kindel factory on South Division, The Wege Foundation signed on for $150,000. Next Step is now half way to meeting its goal. Next Step’s mission matches The Wege’s Foundation’s, including the environment as the reconstructed Kindel plant will follow the U.S.G.B.A.’s green building standards.
Pictured here is the once proud Kindel Furniture plant that next year will again produce fine hand-crafted furniture when Next Step moves in giving not just jobs, but also hope and self-esteem to those men and women looking for a second chance in life.
The ultimate goal for Next Step employees was summarized in a response from a local business. After proving herself for a year at Next Step, one worker got this response from an employment application. “We checked out your work history and you have a job.”
Click on these links to find out more about Scott Jonkhoff’s vision for helping people who’ve paid big consequences for their destructive choices and now ask only for a fair chance to start new, healthy, and productive lives.
Six years ago 14 students entered the sixth grade at Grand Rapids Public School’s City High Middle to attend the brand new Center for Economicology, CFE. This innovative environmental school was started by the late Peter Wege with a curriculum based on his philosophy of balancing the needs of the economy with those of the ecology. This year those initial CFE students will graduate from Grand Rapids Public School, City High Middle, that U.S. News just named the number-one public high school in Michigan, 83rd in the nation.
The same year Wege launched the Center for Economicology, he also funded the incorporation of the International Baccalaureate program into the City High Middle School curriculum, another reason the Economicology School was ranked the top performing school in the state.
What The Wege Foundation is especially proud of in this announcement is that this public school has a culturally diverse population with forty percent of their students on free or reduced lunch programs. For the majority of the other top-ranked public schools, only zero-to-ten percent of their students qualify for free or reduced lunches.
In keeping with their economicology philosophy, the graduating class has decided they will do a “Zero Carbon Green Graduation” meaning they will wear recycled gowns and mortar boards in a rainbow of whatever colored caps and gowns they can find along with other sustainable attributes.
Peter Wege’s grandson Andrew Goodwillie used the occasion of Earth Day to remember his grandfather when he introduced architect Edward Mazria as this year’s 19th annual Wege Foundation Speaker. “To ‘Grampie,’” Andrew told the crowd at Aquinas College’s PAC, “every day was Earth Day, not just one day a year.” Andrew went on to say about Peter M. Wege, who died in July 2014, “My grandfather dedicated his life to making West Michigan and the world a better place. He inspired us all.”
Goodwillie introduced Mazria’s talk on an international movement to reduce carbon emissions from buildings by saying, “Grampie never met a building he didn’t want to turn into a green building.” In 2006 Edward Mazria founded Architecture 2030, a think tank created to accomplish exactly that.
Since half the energy used in the U.S. is consumed by buildings, Architecture 2030’s mission is to reduce by 50% the amount of fossil fuels in the built environment by 2030. The long-term goal is to reach zero emissions from buildings by 2050. Because 75% of all greenhouse gas comes from urban centers, the 2030 movement targets cities, with Seattle having been the first.
In the nine years since Mazria launched Architecture 2030, eight more cities have signed on with pledges from both the public and private sectors to meet the 50% reduction by the 20230 deadline. The day after Mazria’s Wege Lecture, the city of Grand Rapids voted to begin the process that will make it a 2030 city by the end of the year. (See related news article.)
By 2030 today’s 7.2 billion people will be joined by 1.1 billion more, mostly in cities. Constructing enough new space to house that many more people is equivalent to adding another New York City every 35 days. “We must lock in our energy needs,” Mazria emphasized, “because if we stop emissions now, over time the planet will be able to reabsorb the carbon.” Architecture 2030 intends to help Earth make that happen by cutting energy used by buildings in half within fifteen years.
Three generations of the Wege family meet with architect Edward Mazria after he gave the annual Wege Lecture at Aquinas College. From the left, Peter O’Connor, husband of the late Peter M. Wege’s granddaughter Sara holding their baby Peter Charles; Mary Goodwillie Nelson, Wege’s daughter; Edward Mazria and Andrew Goodwillie, Mary Nelson’s son who introduced Mazria at the Wege Lecture.
