People don’t see Mary Gundersen’s name on a museum or Robert and Helen Harmony’s names in front of a school of medicine. Oscar Boonshoft they were not.

But those are just two examples of lesser-known people who set up charitable funds at The Dayton Foundation. Area experts say philanthropists come from all walks of life and contribute to all segments of society.

“The exciting thing is the broadening base of philanthropy,” said Fred Bartenstein, an organizational consultant based in Yellow Springs and a former Dayton Foundation president.

“It’s the retired teacher or firefighter or 25-year-old technology worker, the neighborhood activist. There are more people part of philanthropy than there has ever been at any point in history.”

Gundersen and the Harmonys exemplify Bartenstein’s point.

According to Dayton Foundation President Mike Parks, Gundersen worked at Huffy for 49 years and lived frugally. After her death in 1994, she left more than $600,000 in an unrestricted fund to be used for the community’s highest need.

The charity has given out more than $537,000 to groups such as Daybreak, the Dayton Theatre Guild and Aullwood Audubon Center and Farm. The fund still has nearly $600,000.

The Harmonys were production workers at General Motors. Parks said their legacy was to pay for underprivileged children to go to camp. The fund was set up in 1994 with $1.2 million. Since then, it has used $592,000 to send 4,500 children to camp. The fund has $1.1 million.

“Those are just a couple examples of people that you may not have normally thought about,” Parks said. “They made significant and permanent legacies.”

In 2008, Americans gave more than $307 billion, according to the USA Giving Foundation. The last figures from The Dayton Foundation show $38.7 million being given to 1,100 charities through more than 14,000 grants in a year.

Local officials say corporate giving has been the hardest hit. That certainly is the case for the Dayton Fund, which since 1964 has been a last resort for low-income homeowners who can’t afford conventional loans for emergency repairs.

Ellen L. Trietsch, the fund’s executive director, said the organization has leaned heavily on giving from corporations, corporate foundations and lenders but has had help lately from private citizens.

“People in Dayton have been hit really hard by the departure of larger companies,” said Susanne Weaver, who with her husband, Paul, are chairs for Culture Works. “But we’re strong when it comes to community support. We’ve had levies passed in tough times. People have voted for libraries, parks the welfare of mentally challenged people.”

Weaver said the programs through Dayton that benefit from philanthropy range from the Schuster Center to aid for the needy.

“As much as I love the arts, there are social services that I support,” Weaver said. “You need it all. If it’s all about social services and no arts, then you’ve lost creativity. If it’s all creativity and you’re not taking care of the poor, that’s not a good scene.”

Ron Budzik said the holes left by individual donors will get filled by others, even if it means more people giving smaller amounts.

“When there’s a good project that needs to be funded, someone somehow steps up,” said Budzik, a former Mead Corp. executive and Dayton Business Committee member instrumental in the Schuster Center’s formation. “When there’s a worthwhile project in the community, it gets done.”