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Wilson develops, implements and oversees charitable activities and corporate affairs programs, including leading the Playboy Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the company. In addition to directing the annual Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Awards program and overseeing the Freedom of Expression Award at the Sundance Film Festival, Wilson directs corporate charitable events and fundraising projects for not-for-profit organizations working within the Foundation's areas of interest. She is based in Playboy's Chicago headquarters.
A Playboy employee since 1976, Wilson was named Foundation grants and programs manager in 1982. She was promoted to executive director of the Foundation in 1984 and named director of public affairs in 1989. She was appointed vice president in 2000.
Wilson is a founder of Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art, and serves as its president. She is also on the board of the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois, to which she was elected vice president in 1997. Wilson also serves on a variety of state and municipal grant-review panels, including the Illinois Arts Council and Arts Midwest. She is a member of the Advisory Council of the Women's Business Development Center and has served as a member of the board of directors of the National Coalition Against Censorship from 1997 to 2000. She also was a member of the AIDS Foundation of Chicago's board of directors from 1989 to 1999, and served as its president from 1990 to 1993. Wilson also lectures on philanthropy and other topics.
Listed since 1988 in Who's Who Among African Americans and, since 1990, in the Who's Who Among American Women, Wilson was saluted as one of Chicago's up-and-coming black business and professional women in 1985 by Dollars and Sense magazine. In 1984, she was inducted into the Black Woman Hall of Fame in recognition of her community service. In 1991, Wilson was honored as a "Friend for Life" by the Howard Brown Medical Center. She received the "Phenomenal Woman Award" in 1997 at Chicago's Expo for Today's Black Woman, in recognition of her leadership and dedication to community issues. In 1999, Wilson was honored by the AIDS Foundation of Chicago for her "leadership, compassion and generosity." She was named to Who"s Who of American Women in 2002.
A native Chicagoan, Wilson is a 1976 graduate of the University of Illinois at Chicago. | 