Photo by Richard Maack

Following in her father’s footsteps, Julie Sullivan helps empower African nations through a Valley nonprofit that’s been based in Scottsdale for more than 20 years.

His Wrigley gum rests in the drawer of her desk. His honorary doctorate degrees and photos of presidential handshakes line her walls. And, most notably, the Reverend Leon H. Sullivan’s cause consumes his daughter’s heart. It’s been seven years since Julie Sullivan lost her dad to leukemia and four since she moved into his office on a well-manicured corner of 50th Street and Shea Boulevard in Scottsdale. That’s when she took over his job as chief executive of one of America’s most influential, on-the-ground nonprofits empowering Sub-Saharan Africa to become safe, healthy and self-sufficient.
Julie has a small office but big shoes to fill. Her dad was a celebrated civil rights activist who ran in circles with Martin Luther King Jr. and Nelson Mandela, graced the pages of Time and Fortune magazines, and earned an entry in Encyclopedia Britannica. Then he founded IFESH – the International Foundation for Education & Self-Help – and though few people realize it, the organization and its powerful members have been headquartered in Scottsdale since 1986.
“He mentored me like he mentored thousands. He said, ‘You could move mountains,’” she says in the foundation’s modest boardroom, a picture of her father hanging on a stark wall behind her. “I never understood that until he passed away and I took on his work.”
Julie’s own journey to Africa began when she was just 15 years old. Her family accompanied her dad on one of his many trips, and they attended a church service in Ghana. Julie arrived in her Sunday best, pressed clothes and clean shoes, and came face-to-face with an African girl in a tattered dress and bare feet.
“She had such love and dignity in her bearing,” Julie recalls. “I was astounded that a little child could have such character, such regal bearing. Although she had no material wealth, she had something.
“I still see her face.”