About Bill Cummings

Bill Cummings founded suburban-Boston commercial real estate firm Cummings Properties 50 years ago, and grew its portfolio from one 6,000-square-foot building to more than 10 million square feet across 11 communities. His unusual but proven formula has included purchasing distressed properties, carrying zero mortgages, and eliminating extra cost by offering lease, design, and build all in-house. What's more, he determined years ago that his legacy would be not only his buildings but also a foundation that is funded by lease income and gives back in the communities where the company operates.

Bill and Joyce Cummings were the first Massachusetts couple to join the Giving Pledge, an international philanthropic organization founded by Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett that encourages the world's wealthiest individuals to commit the majority of their assets to charitable causes. Cummings Foundation has awarded more than a quarter-billion dollars in grants to date, mostly in eastern Massachusetts.

Bill earned a bachelor's degree from Tufts University, and has since been honored by Tufts and several other universities with honorary doctorates. Among his many other recognitions are Real Estate Entrepreneur of the Year from New England by Ernst & Young, Edward H. Linde Public Service Award from National Association of Industrial and Office Properties (NAIOP), and Real Estate Visionary of the Year from Boston Business Journal. In addition, Cummings Properties' restoration of the historic United Shoe Machinery Corp. complex in Beverly was the subject of a laudatory October 2, 1997 feature story in The Wall Street Journal by Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic Ada Louise Huxtable.

In 2018, Bill released his self-written memoir, Starting Small and Making It Big: An Entrepreneur's Journey to Billion-Dollar Philanthropist, which includes thoughtful reflections on the lessons he has learned about business, entrepreneurship, and philanthropy.

Lecture Agenda

5:30pm
Lecture starts

6:00 pm
Students and alumni present a selection of Gateway and Huxtable Fellowship efforts

6:30 pm
Moderated panel discussion