August 17, 1999
The late Mildred Pursell Wolf used contributions from friends and family memorializing her late husband, E.L. "Bud" Wolf, to begin the fund at the Kansas University Endowment Association in 1984. Additional contributions from Mildred Wolf and her estate were periodically added to the fund until 1998, when her son John Wolf decided that the fund was large enough to be used as his mother had intended.
Awarded for the first time in the fall of 1999, the E.L. and Mildred Pursell Wolf Graduate Scholarship will provide scholarships to Kansas high-school graduates pursuing graduate coursework in biology.
Graduate students Gretchen Dollar and Alex Fraser, both of Lawrence, are the first recipients of the scholarship. Dollar is a student in molecular biosciences, and Fraser is a student in ecology and evolutionary biology.
"We're pleased and delighted to award this scholarship to Gretchen and Alex," said Jim Orr, chair of the Division of Biological Sciences. "Scholarships such as this one provided by the Wolfs enhance our program. In particular, we are grateful that this fund enables us to grant scholarships to some of our outstanding graduate students involved in research."
Mildred Wolf's son John, the assistant dean of continuing education at KU, earned both a bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1962 and a master's in philosophy in 1966 from KU. John Wolf said that each of his parents were the first in their families to earn a college degree. "I think that people who had that experience had a greater appreciation for the value of education," he said. "I suspect that they had to make a lot of sacrifices."
Mildred Wolf was 17 when she arrived at Watkins Scholarship Hall and began her college education at KU during the Great Depression. While working part time, she earned a bachelor's degree in 1936, majoring in English and graduating Phi Beta Kappa. She earned a master's degree in zoology in 1939, and graduated as a member of Sigma Xi. While pursuing her master's degree at KU, she taught anatomy classes and worked under professor H. H. Lane, director of the Museum of Natural History. She later married Bud Wolf, an electrical engineer from Cleveland, Ohio. The Wolfs had three children, John, Richard and Jim.
Creating a scholarship fund for biology students was an appropriate use for the fund, John Wolf said, noting that he and his brothers shared their mother's interests in plants and animals. "I just think it's a great fit," he said. "It's something from which the university will benefit and it accomplishes our end of providing a nice memorial to our parents."
The fund will be administrated by the KU Endowment Association, an independent, nonprofit organization serving as the official fund-raising and fund management foundation for the University of Kansas. Founded in 1891, the KU Endowment Association is the oldest foundation of its type at a public university in the United States and one of the largest.
Story by Jen Humphrey