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You are here: Home / Philanthropy / Making Money off Poison

Making Money off Poison

January 24th, 2019 by Sallie Bingham in Philanthropy Leave a Comment

Photo: Tamara Rodriguez Reichberg

Sackler family protest at Harvard Art Museums in Cambridge, Massachusetts last Friday. Photo: Tamara Rodriguez Reichberg.

We’ve been reading a lot in the past few months about the opioid crisis that had claimed, and continues to claim, many lives, but no so much about the Sackler family, which started Purdue Pharma. Three generations of the family sit or have sat on the board of this giant corporation, which raises, inevitably, the question of an individual’s responsibility for a product that is a poison.

As is almost always the case in this situation, members of the Sackler family have donated a portion of their wealth to the Smithsonian, the Guggenheim and Harvard. More interesting, and more unexpected, is Elizabeth Sackler’s gift to the Brooklyn Museum, which produced a wing devoted to Judy Chicago’s Dinner Party (after it had languished in storage for decades) and changing shows of feminist art from all over the world.

Can such generosity undo the effects of OxyContin?

Obviously not.

The cliche, "All great fortunes are founded on a crime" is true more often than not.

Can such generosity absolve the members of the Sackler family from responsibility?

This is much more difficult to answer. And the situation is not unique. The cliche, “All great fortunes are founded on a crime” is true more often than not. No hard-working man—or, even less likely, woman—becomes a billionaire through nine-to-five travail. It takes a windfall of some sort—marrying a rich woman or, in extreme cases, marrying her and then killing her. This is the dark secret that lies at the heart of the patriarchy. Or creating an addictive drug, or amassing billions off extractive industries, or pilling up a fortune from Nicotine addiction, as is the case with Doris Duke. Inheritors seldom summon the courage to address this painful issue, and the public, dazzled by acts of generosity—and, as always, blinded by the glitter of enormous fortunes—seldom demands an account.

But times are changing. Massachusetts recently brought a suit against certain Sacklers, accusing them of deceiving the public about the drug’s risks. Not only the creation of the poison but its aggressive marketing is laid at the door of former Pharma President Richard Sackler. A protest in front of the Metropolitan Museum in New York displayed the names of some individual Sacklers.

Certainly some of the family made their money in other ways, before the creation of Purdue Pharma. And certainly some of the family are worthy individuals, devoted to supporting the arts.

But I doubt if their money can ever be cleansed of this poison.

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In Philanthropy Judy Chicago Brooklyn Museum of Art

A long and fruitful career as a writer began in 1960 with the publication of Sallie Bingham's novel, After Such Knowledge. This was followed by 15 collections of short stories in addition to novels, memoirs and plays, as well as the 2020 biography The Silver Swan: In Search of Doris Duke.

Her latest book, Taken by the Shawnee, is a work of historical fiction published by Turtle Point Press in June of 2024. Her previous memoir, Little Brother, was published by Sarabande Books in 2022. Her short story, "What I Learned From Fat Annie" won the Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize in 2023 and the story "How Daddy Lost His Ear," from her forthcoming short story collection How Daddy Lost His Ear and Other Stories (September 23, 2025), received second prize in the 2023 Sean O’Faolain Short Story Competition.

She is an active and involved feminist, working for women’s empowerment, who founded the Kentucky Foundation for Women, which gives grants to Kentucky artists and writers who are feminists, The Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and Culture at Duke University, and the Women’s Project and Productions in New York City. She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Sallie's complete biography is available here.

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Taken By The Shawnee

Taken By The Shawnee

July 6th, 2025
Sallie Bingham introduces and reads from her latest work, Taken by the Shawnee.
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Rebecca Reynolds & Salie Bingham at SOMOS

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Taken by the Shawnee Reading

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This reading took place at The Church of the Holy Faith in Santa Fe, New Mexico in August of 2024.

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Years ago a man I was in love with persuaded me to have a large fish pond dug near my studio. I think it was his attempt to be part of my necessarily solitary life there; like other such attempts it failed—and now I'm left with the fish pond! https://buff.ly/fGgnN39 #Koi #KoiPond

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