John Hopkinson – then IEE President, inventor of the three-phase power distribution system, and pioneer of electric railways – became the benevolent fund’s first committee chair.

On 10 October 1900, the fund awarded its first grant – £20 (about £2,500 today) – to Charles Capito, an engineer who authored papers on electrical engineering, mathematics and mechanics.

One standout grant in the early 20th century was support for the widow and daughters of Heinrich Hertz, the German physicist who proved the existence of electromagnetic waves. His daughter Mathilde Hertz went on to become one of the first female pioneers of biology.

One anonymous member donated his house as a home for “aged, infirm or convalescent members”. The second donation was from Charles Speirs who offered his house and estate to house people returning from the war.

As the number of Local Centres (now called Local Networks) grew, so did the Court of Governors, with nearly 50 people meeting 3 times a year.

Charles Speirs gifted the charity the funds to purchase his estate, continuing its use to support engineers. In 1977, half of the estate was sold to finance the conversion of Chester House into a modern residential home – renamed Speirs House – providing accommodation for 26 residents.

In 2002, the organisation formed a smaller board of 10 trustees.

The IEE and IIE merged to become the IET. The charity changed its official name to ‘the Institution of Engineering and Technology Benevolent Fund’. We chose ‘IET Connect’ as our trading name, to reflect that we provided support beyond financial grants.

In 2010, Speirs House was sold and the proceeds used to create the Speirs Fund, which still supports engineers with care and respite needs today.

In 2019, the charity welcomed Jane Petit as the new CEO. We embarked on a research project to find out how we could do more, informing our three-year strategy.

Findings showed that the name ‘IET Connect’ didn’t resonate with our community and the term ‘benevolent fund’ wasn’t familiar. So, we rebranded to Foothold and began expanding the support we offer.

When we launched our three-year strategy in 2019, we set out to provide joined-up, accessible and personalised support, build resilience in our engineering community, and develop our supporter base.

Here’s how we did:

• £5.4m spent for the community
• 41,000 services delivered
• 2,213 people supported
• 60 countries reached

We grew our range of online support for the whole engineering community to include:

• Monthly webinars
• Wellbeing hub
• Mental Health Check-In tool
• Differently Wired Hub for neurodivergent engineers
• Legal factsheets and advice
• InBest benefits calculator