Although Brian Abel Ragen left classroom teaching after almost three decades, he remains involved in higher education in several ways. He now serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of Fontbonne University in St. Louis. Fontbonne was founded as a woman's college in the 1923 by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet and became co-educational in the 1970’s. Ragen counts the opportunity to meet many of its graduates as among the greatest gifts brought to him by living in St. Louis. The most successful M.A. student he ever advised as a professor, his own voice instructor, and many of his dearest friends are Fontbonne alumnae. The college has always had a strong liberal arts tradition, as well as a commitment to training those who serve others through programs such as deaf education. While it has expanded into other areas, ranging from fashion marketing to cyber-security, it has kept its commitment to passing on to its students the heritage of Western Civilization, as well as its Catholic identity the Sisters of St. Joseph's devotion to serving “the dear neighbor.” He has created a scholarship at Fontbonne to support students who will study literature, music, history, or theology—though without necessarily majoring in any of those fields.

Ragen serves as an alumni interviewer for both Pomona College and Princeton University and has established scholarship or fellowship programs at both institutions. He has also joined with many of his cousins to create a scholarship at William Penn University, his guardian Katherine Ragen’s alma mater. That scholarship honors the whole generations of Ragens who lived in Oksaloosa, Iowa.


Eugene Field House


Ragen has served on the board of the Eugene Field House Foundation for several years, and now holds the post of secretary. Ragen’s mother read him Field’s poems when Ragen was a child and worked as a newspaper columnist, the profession Field pioneered. The House is notable not only as Eugene Field’s childhood home, but also as the home of his father, Roswell Field. The elder Field was Dred Scott’s lawyer and made Scott’s case that he should be declared a free man.

Ragen has also been an active supporter of several arts organizations in St. Louis, including the Saint Louis Symphony and Opera Theater of St. Louis. He considers these two organizations to be among the most important arts organizations in America today.

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He is an especially devoted supporter of Saint Louis Public Radio.

He also supports a wide-range of national charities, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Opera, The Charles M. Schulz Museum, The National World War II Museum, and the Smithsonian Institution.

By far the largest part of Ragen’s charitable activities are carried out through church groups and orders of chivalry.