Alumna gifts to honor apparel and textiles, extension

Tuesday, September 11th, 2007

Three College of Human Ecology alumni have committed gifts totaling $856,000 to college faculty and students. They are:

- Barbara Weigand, $506,000 to establish the Barbara Weigand Professorship in Apparel and Textiles.

- Margaret Beryl Guy, $250,000 to establish the Guy Family Extension Excellence Fund.

- Cheryl L. Wilch Jordan, $100,000 to establish the Dr. Cheryl L. Wilch Jordan Graduate Fellowship in Apparel and Textiles.

Barbara Weigand

Weigand, a native of Topeka, Kan., lives in Oneonta, N.Y. She graduated from Kansas State University in 1943 with a bachelor’s degree in home economics education and in 1951 with a master’s degree in clothing and textiles. She taught clothing in the Wichita and Valley Center, Kan., areas before teaching at Central Washington University, Ellensburg, Wash. She then moved to New York where she taught clothing for 29 years at the State University of New York in Oneonta.

“My decision to establish the Barbara Weigand Professorship in Apparel and Textiles stems from my appreciation of the professors who guided me through my degrees at Kansas State,” Weigand said. “I wish to recognize Alpha Latzke, Esther Cormany and Lois Gilmore. I owe so much to Gertrude Lienkaemper who made ‘History of Costume’ a pure delight.”

Weigand’s gift was made by naming the KSU Foundation as the beneficiary of multiple retirement plans. The professorship was established as part of the Kansas Partnership for Faculty of Distinction program to attract and retain the highest quality faculty to regents’ institutions in the state. The state acts as a partner, providing supplemental funding to the income earnings of each qualifying gift when a fund reaches a minimum of $500,000 for an endowed professorship or chair at one of the state regents’ institutions.

The recipient of this professorship will be a faculty member in the Department of Apparel, Textiles, and Interior Design in the College of Human Ecology at K-State. In 2006 she established the Barbara Weigand Scholarship in Apparel Marketing.

Cheryl Wilch Jordan

A native of Topeka, Jordan earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from K-State in apparel and textiles from the College of Human Ecology in 1968 and 1971. She received her doctoral degree in textile and apparel merchandising from Oklahoma State University in 1987. She retired as a professor at Oregon State University in 2004. She lives in Covallis, Ore.

The commitment will provide financial assistance for graduate students enrolled in the apparel and textiles graduate program who are specializing in apparel and textile marketing.

“In our estate plan one of our goals is to recognize people and organizations that have played important roles in our lives,” Jordan said. “Kansas State University provided the education from which we launched our careers and is an institution for which we have many fond memories.”

Margaret Beryl Guy

Of her commitment, $245,000 will create the Guy Family Extension Excellence Fund. The additional $5,000 will benefit the Arlene Tinkler Memorial Fund. The excellence fund will provide financial assistance to Kansas research and extension programs in family and consumer sciences.

Guy, who lives in Dallas, is a native of Coffeyville, Kan. She is a 1952 graduate of K-State with a bachelor’s degree from the College of Human Ecology. Guy later earned a master’s degree from Texas Tech University in 1957. She served as a county extension agent and clothing specialist in Kansas and Texas. She retired from the Texas Cooperative Extension Service in 1986.

The endowment honors Guy’s family’s commitment to excellence in education for home and community. Guy’s mother, Beryl Guy, was a member and leader of the earliest Extension Homemaker and 4-H clubs in Kansas. Her brother, William “Bill” Guy, was a 4-H member and county agriculture agent and farm management specialist for southeast Kansas. Helen Guy Robertson, Guy’s sister, was also an active 4-H member. Other family who attended K-State are her brother, Tom Guy, who played on the varsity basketball team in the 1940s, as well as two nieces, two nephews and their spouses.

“Our family has intersected with KSU since the 1880s when our great-grandfather was on the Board of Regents,” Guy said. “This bequest is a pay back for all the great experiences and the education that our family enjoyed and we hope other families can now share in the KSU legacy.”

A bequest is a gift made through a will or trust that enables a donor to retain total control of assets during his or her lifetime and determine the distribution of assets upon the donor’s death.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 11th, 2007 and is filed under Dean's Blog.