Mary Cantu, one of my best friends and colleagues passed away in February of 2025.
I was contacted a couple months ago by her college friends about using a website I registered to help them raise money for an endowment at Mount Holyoke College. The endowment would be in honor of Mary and fund “summer fellowships providing stipends to students working in the areas that Mary championed and who would otherwise not have access to those opportunities”
After working with them for a couple months I feel it is time to announce that they are currently taking pledges for the endowment, and in October of 2026 (aka this year), the donation campaign will begin and go on for 12 months. The goal for the endowment is $100,000 and as of now there are over $40,000 in pledges.
If you knew Mary, you know she had a community impact larger than life! Her purpose in life was to help others through building artist community and with environmental impact taken into consideration.
I mentioned Mary as a best friend and colleague because we worked on so many projects together, and she literally would hang out with my family and extended family. I was with her as she founded Spare Parts as a 501c3, as she hosted Spare Parts Fine Arts Fair, worked with Gabby Santiago and many more on the Mini Art Museum and in general created a space for thousands of people to be impacted by her work. With the Spare Parts Fine Arts Fairs alone, she hosted hundreds of teachers to come and get their arts supplies for that coming year.
She was known as a community organizer and doer, someone who reached out and would follow up. Her Fifth Friday’s hosted at the Carver Center are a great example of little initiatives that added up in terms of community impact.
My Family’s humble ask is if you can donate between Oct 2026 and October 2027, please fill out a pledge form. Whether you can donate $10 or $10,000, any amount is appreciated. Additionally if you can share this information with like minded individuals, companies, non-profits, government officials, etc; it would be most appreciated. Thank you so much for your time. If you are reading this, know how much it means to me that you made it this far.
Additional information marycantu.org
Past stories I personally published about Mary’s impact
Thank you,
Joey & Family