Educating Young Americans Through Estate Giving: The Story of Sylvia Stowell

Educating Young Americans Through Estate Giving:

The Story of Sylvia Stowell

By Victor Bernson, Vice President & General Counsel

Ms. Sylvia Stowell grew up during the Great Depression in Bryant Pond, Maine, a small section of the village of Woodstock, many miles from the nearest city. Today, the population of Woodstock is more than 1,200, but not long ago, it was a close-knit hamlet of just a few hundred people.

From an early age, Sylvia was passionate about education. She was a great student, and when it came time to choose a profession, she wasted no time in deciding she would become a teacher. She delighted in helping children learn to read, especially those with disabilities.

After World War II, Sylvia traveled extensively, teaching U.S. Air Force

Sylvia Stowell (second from left) learns the lifelong values of patriotism and personal responsibility while growing up in a tight-knit family in Bryant Pond, Maine, during the Great Depression.

Join the Ranch in the Sky Legacy Society

Through Young America’s Foundation’s Ranch in the Sky Legacy Society, patriotic Americans are empowered to create their personal legacies of educating young people and advancing freedom. By including YAF in their estate plans, YAF’s Legacy Society members enjoy many benefits, including: • Lifelong membership in YAF’s President’s Club and invitations to exclusive events • A beautiful recognition plaque • Their names permanently engraved on the special Legacy Society panel on Freedom Wall at the Reagan Ranch • An engraved stone at the Reagan Ranch in honor of Executive Members of the Legacy Society once documentation of an estate gift is shared • An oak tree planted at the Reagan Ranch in honor of Torch of Freedom Society Members of YAF’s Legacy Society once documentation of an estate The names of YAF’s Legacy Society members are permanently gift of $1 million or more is shared engraved on Freedom Wall at the Reagan Ranch.

Please update your estate plans to include Young America’s Foundation by sharing this sample bequest language with your attorney: I give, devise, and bequeath to Young America’s Foundation, tax identification number 23-7042029, 11480 Commerce Park Drive, Sixth Floor, Reston, Virginia 20191 (insert percentage, amount or nature of gift, or remainder of estate) to be used for educational purposes (or to support the Reagan Ranch Fund).

Contact Legacy Society & Development Relations Director Clare Hinshaw at 800-USA-1776 or chinshaw@yaf.org to enroll in the Legacy Society or request a free estate planning guide.

family members in Japan, Germany, and England. When she returned home, she moved to Massachusetts, teaching for many years in the public schools of Stoneham and the great Revolutionary War town of Lexington.

Sylvia was quite prudent with the teacher’s salary that she earned. She lived modestly, surrounding herself with the greatest wealth of all—many close family members and friends. Throughout her life, she saved and invested wisely, building a considerable nest egg.

Apart from friends and family, Sylvia cared most about her country. She was an unabashed American patriot who believed deeply in individual freedom and traditional values. She eventually found an organization that advanced her values: Young America’s Foundation.

Before she retired from teaching, Sylvia began recommending to promising young people that they attend YAF’s student conferences. One of those young people was her 16-year-old nephew, Chase Martin, who attended YAF’s annual National Conservative Student Conference in 1996 in Washington, D.C.

Chase was mesmerized by the likes of Rich Lowry, who is currently the editor-in-chief of National Review, and Hillsdale College economic historian Dr. Burt Folsom. He says the experience changed his life, noting,

YAF equipped me with the tools to challenge professors in college and law school and started me on the road to

“There aren’t many groups doing what you’re doing. [It] seems like instead of an education, kids are getting brainwashed in schools today. That’s no education.”

— SYLVIA STOWELL public service. I learned that we have to fight for what we believe in, and if we do, we can win.

Today, Chase is continuing to fight the good fight, working with conservative organizations to help them challenge liberal public policies across America.

Having seen the difference YAF made in her own nephew’s life, Sylvia became a financial supporter of the Foundation. She made her first charitable gift of $28 to YAF in 1996 and gave the same amount again in 1997. In 2000, after retiring from her teaching career, Sylvia attended a YAF regional conference in Boston and remarked afterwards,

There aren’t many groups doing what you’re doing. [It] seems like instead of an education, kids are getting brainwashed in schools today. That’s no education.

In 2005, Sylvia took the important step that would help cement her

personal legacy and, in the process, make a vital difference in the future of America. She included Young America’s Foundation as a beneficiary of her estate. At the time, she shared that she was interested in helping young people, and she loved that YAF was in the business of finding and developing young leaders.

When Sylvia Stowell Hauzenblas passed away at the age of 88 on May 7, 2021, at her beloved home in Bryant Pond, she bequeathed to YAF an estate gift of nearly $2 million that will support young Americans for years to come.

Sylvia Stowell lived a wonderful life and is an American hero. Her legacy is educating and inspiring future generations of Americans with conservative ideas.

At Young America’s Foundation, we know that estate giving changes lives, and we are grateful for all Americans who make the significant decision to leave a bequest to YAF.

Over the years, YAF and the Conservative Movement as a whole have not only persisted, but also grown and prospered due in no small part to generous estate gifts.

In 1998, for instance, YAF became the beneficiary of a significant bequest from John Engalitcheff—a Baltimorebased entrepreneur and anti-communist originally from Russia—that saved President Ronald Reagan’s beloved home, Rancho del Cielo. Because of Engalitcheff’s generosity, YAF was able to preserve the Reagan Ranch as a place for young people to gain inspiration from Ronald Reagan’s character and timeless principles of freedom.

As Sylvia Stowell and John Engalitcheff have demonstrated, the future of our blessed country is in the hands of patriotic and generous Americans.

Sylvia Stowell enjoys celebrating the graduation of her nephew, Chase Martin, a YAF alumnus, from the University of Maine School of Law in 2011. A young Stowell enjoys the outdoors of Maine, later becoming an avid gardener at her lake house, located in her hometown of Bryant Pond.

Commentator Sean Hannity addresses a Young America’s Foundation conference that Sylvia Stowell attends after she begins supporting YAF. Economic historian Dr. Burt Folsom (pictured here) inspires Chase Martin, Sylvia Stowell’s nephew, at YAF’s National Conservative Student Conference in 1996—an experience that leads Martin to a career in the Conservative Movement.

Spring 2022 Volume 43 • Number 1

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In early 2022, Young America’s Foundation launched the Great Beginnings Seminar at the Reagan Ranch, our inaugural program to educate middle school students in the ideas of individual freedom, a strong national defense, free enterprise, and traditional values. Participants enjoyed a once-in-a-lifetime experience—touring Rancho del Cielo, President Ronald Reagan’s “Western White House” located outside of Santa Barbara—and learned about the American values denigrated in many schools today.