If you ask Josh Gibb what keeps him here—here being western Illinois, the Monmouth-Roseville region, the place where he grew up—he won’t talk about nostalgia. He’ll talk about legacy.

Josh is the president and CEO of Galesburg Community Foundation, where he helps individuals and families direct their philanthropy with intention, so it can make a lasting difference. Whether that difference is in scholarships, arts programs, food security, education, or local nonprofits, Josh’s job is to connect big hearts to smart opportunities—and to ensure those efforts endure.

“We build permanent endowment to support the charitable interests of people in Knox, Warren, and Henderson counties,” he explains. “That money goes on working, long after any one of us is gone.”

Josh knows a little something about time-tested investments—because he is one. A 1997 graduate of Roseville High School, he grew up immersed in the life of a small community. After a start at Carl Sandburg College, where he was student trustee, he transferred to Western Illinois University and majored in political science, discovering a love for policy and the possibilities it opens.

“I thought I’d head to Springfield or D.C., work on the Hill, maybe shape things from the inside out,” he says. But before he could make that leap, something smaller—and more significant—caught his attention.

He returned home to manage the local grocery store in Roseville, a yearlong role that would leave a bigger mark than he expected. “You learn a lot in the aisles of a grocery store,” he says. “About people, about responsibility, about listening.”

From there, he entered the Farm Bureau’s county manager program, which landed him in Knox County. By the time an opportunity came to join the Galesburg Community Foundation, he had the skills—and the relationships—to make a meaningful jump. That was 17 years ago.

Today, the foundation manages an endowment that spins off more than $3 million annually in support for local nonprofits. But what makes Josh’s work remarkable isn’t just the dollars. It’s the mindset he brings to philanthropy.

“When people come in wanting to start a scholarship or create a fund,” he says, “we sit with them. We talk about their values. Their parents. Their hometown. And sometimes we help shape that vision into something even bigger than what they imagined.”

It’s strategic. It’s personal. And it’s deeply rooted in the communities it serves.

Josh helped develop the Roseville Community Fund, a fund of Galesburg Community foundation, that keep donations focused locally. When Roseville residents were challenged to raise $70,000 for the fund, they exceeded the mark—and half the donations came from outside the ZIP code, spread across 12 states.

“People care,” Josh says. “They just need a clear way to connect.”

For all the scale and structure of his professional life, Josh is still a small-town guy. His parents still live locally. His wife’s family is nearby in Bushnell. And he’s raising his own five children in the same region that raised him.

“The Community Foundation let me stay,” he says. “Stay in a place that formed me. Stay close to the people I love.”

Recently, Josh was honored by Monmouth-Roseville’s Hall of Achievement, a celebration of distinguished alumni that recognizes not just what someone has accomplished—but how they’ve used those accomplishments to give back. His seventh-grade teacher, who taught science, chorus, and drama, served as his nominator.

“She said things more gracious than I deserved,” Josh says, his voice softening. “But it meant the world to hear them.”

For Josh, success isn’t about prestige or spotlight. It’s about building the structures that help good people do good things, quietly and consistently.

It’s about staying power—the kind you can’t always see, but that you always feel.

And it’s about making sure that what matters most never leaves home.