Join us as we honor members of our community whose extraordinary contributions to our mission are uplifting us to nourish minds and bodies; empower families and communities.
Tuesday, June 10, 2025
5:00 to 7:30 pm
Mercer Street Friends Foodbank
3 Graphics Drive
Ewing, NJ 08628
Honorees
Bank of America, Corporate Leadership & Public Service Award
Phyllis Stoolmacher, Humanitarian Award
Dan Rodgers, Robert M. Appelbaum Service Award
Corporate Leadership & Public Service Award
Bank of America, a longstanding partner and steadfast supporter of the Mercer Street Friends mission, exemplifies corporate leadership and a deep commitment to strengthening communities through meaningful action. By investing in local initiatives, it helps create pathways for New Jersey residents to achieve stability and thrive. Since 2019, the bank’s employees have contributed over 502,000 volunteer hours to support New Jersey nonprofits. Mercer Street Friends is proud to stand alongside Bank of America in the fight against food insecurity and the pursuit of a stronger Mercer County.
Phyllis Stoolmacher, Humanitarian Award
Phyllis Stoolmacher spent 30 years at Mercer Street Friends where she guided and fostered the growth of the Food Bank from its infancy to its emergence as the primary provider of food to anti-hunger programs in Mercer County. She was responsible for overseeing all areas of running the Food Bank: operations, food procurement, fundraising, marketing, advocacy, launching child hunger programs such as Send Hunger Packing (SHUP) and summer feeding, and the joyful, yet firm, cultivation of its volunteer corps. Phyllis received a bachelor’s degree from Michigan State University and a master’s degree from Rutgers University where she studied as an Eagleton Graduate Fellow. She lives in West Windsor with her husband, Irwin, and continues her involvement with the Food Bank as a volunteer.
Dan Rodgers, Robert M. Appelbaum Service Award
Dan Rodgers is the Henry Charles Lea Professor of History Emeritus at Princeton University, where he taught the history of America ideas and culture for over 30 years. He joined the Mercer Street Friends Board in 2000, served as board chair during a critical transition period in its history, 2004-2008, and stayed on to complete 18 years of board service.
His engagement with issues of social justice began as an undergraduate at Brown University in the early 1960s. He joined the first corps of VISTA workers during the “war on poverty,” working with poor rural families in Oregon. He went on to teach at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and then Princeton University, where in addition to his courses in the shifting course of ideas, beliefs, and arguments in American history, he from time to time taught undergraduate seminars on the history of work and the history of poverty.
He is the author of five books, including Age of Fracture, winner of the prestigious Bancroft Prize in American history. His teaching won prizes from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Princeton University. He served as chair of the Princeton University History Department and director of its Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Historical Studies.
Dan lives in Princeton with his wife, Irene, a former public school speech therapist. They are members of the Princeton Friends Meeting.
Thank you to our event sponsors:
