Goodwill Industries International began in Boston in 1902, founded by Dr. Edgar J. Helms, a Methodist Minister in the South End of Boston. Helms' work, which became known as the “Goodwill Movement,” developed out of a need to assist his poor and immigrant parishioners in providing for themselves and their families. Helms developed the idea to collect used household goods and clothing in wealthier areas of the city, and then train and hire the poor and immigrants to mend and repair the used goods. The goods were then re-sold or were given to the people who repaired them. The system worked, and the Goodwill philosophy of “a hand up, not a hand out” was born. Locations quickly began to spring up across the country.

In the Bay Area, Helms worked with Reverend Samuel Quickmire to help establish Goodwill of San Francisco, which began in 1916 in an earthquake shelter at 16th and Mission Streets. It became the first of seven Goodwills in Northern California to be established over a twenty-year period and the third in the United States. Fire destroyed at least two different sites before the organization moved to 980 Howard in the late 1930s, where it remained until the building was destroyed by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

After the earthquake, Goodwill of San Francisco (as it was then called) secured a temporary home on what was then Army Street. A major fundraising campaign was launched to fund a new permanent headquarters. The organization secured a $17 million non-repayable grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Goodwill also conducted its first capital campaign, which raised an additional $2.4 million. Goodwill moved to its current location at 1500 Mission Street in 1995.

Goodwill Industries of San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin Counties is one of 208 autonomous Goodwill organizations in the nation. We are part of a membership organization, Goodwill Industries International.