JAY FREY

WHEELING – Wheeling native Jay Frey started off playing clarinet and getting a degree in music education, but his career led him to play a different tune that led him to the top of his profession as a fundraiser.

There were stops in Philadelphia, New York, New Jersey and Chicago before he found his way back to Wheeling 42 years later.

Frey was born and raised in Wheeling, and graduated from the former Triadelphia High School in 1968. From there, he went on to Oberlin College to study music education, where he played the clarinet.

Frey’s first job was at The Hill School in the Philadelphia area.

“Ever after that, until I came back to this area in 2010, I lived out of state. That was all driven by employment,” he said.

But it was later at the Harvey School in Westchester County, New York that he found his true calling. Shortly after his arrival there, there was a massive fire that destroyed the main building.

“There was a great need to fill the gap of what was an underinsured facility,” he explained. “That’s how I got into fundraising. They had a not very consistent or pro-active fundraising base.”

Frey called upon mentors at The Hill School and put together a fundraising effort to rebuild the school.

“We had a lot of good will out there waiting to be tapped into given the circumstances,” he continued. “I eventually moved into fundraising full-time.”

He stayed at the school from 1974 until 1981.

Frey next went to Kent Place School in Summit, New Jersey, where he stayed there until 1986.

“After a very successful capital campaign…I got a call from a recruiter, which ended up with me being hired at the Harvard Medical School,” he said. “I had a very good experience there, actually.”

After five years, the campaign he led at Harvard wrapped up, and he was next recruited by the University of Chicago Medical Center. He lived in the Windy City for the next 18 years.

“I was in Chicago as long as I was in Wheeling, up to that point in my life,” Frey said. “I was with several different organizations there, including the Chicago History Museum. I consulted independently there, and with a small firm.”

Then one of his former employees at the museum was hired as president of the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh Foundation. In 2010, he contacted Frey about joining him there.

“It was opportune,” he said.

While Frey frequently visited his parents in Wheeling by 2010 they were now “in their 90s” and he saw it as a good time to come back to the region.

“It puts me back within a short drive of my family, and it proved to be a good move for that reason because both my parents passed away in 2011,” Frey continued. “When I started in Pittsburgh, I lived there in rental property and was trying to find some place that was more permanent. I didn’t have a lot of luck.

“My parents’ house was sitting there, so I commuted from Wheeling to Pittsburgh for a time.”

Frey retired in 2014, though he took an interim job at Carlow University for a year as they searched for a new vice president.

“I’m still interested in fundraising, but mostly as a volunteer,” he said.

Frey serves as president of the Wheeling Heritage Foundation, which is a volunteer job. He is also vice-president for the Friends of Wheeling, where he works on fundraising.

He also served as chairman of the Wheeling 250 committee that planned the city’s 250th birthday celebrations.

Frey doesn’t see himself leaving Wheeling.

“Only to travel,” he continued. “I’m 75-years-old, and I’m having a good time with the extra-curriculars that I do. When I came back to Wheeling, I re-established the chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution and I am still president of that…

“When I was away from Wheeling for 42 years, there were a lot of things I wanted to be involved in that I couldn’t because I didn’t live here. When I was able to have the time and be in the right place, I enjoyed it and I still do,” he said.