The Tom Wales Endowment Fund was established on October 17, 2001 as a lasting memorial to an outspoken gun safety advocate and community leader who was shot and killed by an unknown assailant in his Seattle home on October 11, 2001.

Its mission is to celebrate and commemorate Wales' legacy while ensuring that Washington Ceasefire, the organization he helped lead, can remain an active and powerful voice for reducing gun violence for generations to come.

The Tom Wales Endowment Fund hopes to raise a minimum of $2 million, with funds used to further gun-safety education and awareness, as well as to support legislative efforts to reduce gun violence across Washington State and around the nation.

A 1974 graduate of Harvard University and a successful U.S. Attorney, Wales served the federal government for many years. Wales was a champion of reasonable, common-sense solutions designed to reduce handgun violence throughout Washington State and across the nation. In 1997, he led one of the broadest statewide coalitions ever assembled in the effort to pass an initiative mandating a trigger-lock accompany every handgun sold in the state and requiring that all handgun owners successfully complete a safety course or pass a written examination in order to obtain a mandatory gun license. Wales was a courageous leader and tireless advocate for the cause of common sense gun control. During the 2000 elections, he headed an aggressive television campaign highlighting the gun safety issue.