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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 25, 2007
CONTACT: Colene Lind, (785) 227-3311, ext. 8122
ALUMNA LEAVES NEARLY $200K TO BETHANY
LINDSBORG, Kan. — Bethany College is the recipient of an estate gift totaling nearly $200,000, given by one of the college’s oldest alumni.
Upon her death, Dec. 11, in Schenectady, N.Y., Ethel Armstrong Avery left tangible evidence of her love for Bethany through a bequest to the college of nearly $200,000 – the bulk of her estate. Avery was 101.
“Here is a grand example of someone who planted trees under which she would never sit. We are grateful and honored that Ethel Avery chose to shade Bethany students with her bequest,” said Bethany Interim President Robert L. Vogel.
“Ethel’s gift shows the power of planned giving. People of relatively simple means can make a very significant impact through a planned gift. Because of Ethel, many students will enjoy the benefits of a Bethany education as she did,” said Colene Lind, Bethany’s interim vice president for advancement.
Though she had no children of her own, Ethel Armstrong Avery demonstrated a lifelong love of young people and education – and Bethany College. While she lived most of her adult life far from Kansas and Bethany, friends say she spoke often and affectionately of her alma mater.
A member of Bethany’s class of 1926, Avery earned a fine arts degree in expression, combining studies in speech, drama, and literature, and enjoyed singing in the Messiah chorus. She retained a love of music, particularly opera, and literature, and an enthusiasm for learning throughout her life. Upon graduation, she taught English at a private girls’ school in Boise, Idaho, until her 1928 marriage to Harold Avery.
After the couple’s 1947 move to Schenectady, New York, where Harold Avery became a professor of economics at Union College, Ethel Avery earned a master’s degree in library science from the State University of New York at Albany. Putting her love of literature and young people to work again, she served as children’s librarian at the Schenectady County Library until the age of 70. With her husband, and later with a college roommate, she also loved to travel – making many trips to Europe, Russia, and Greece.
After her husband’s death in 1969, Avery often hired Union College students to help with yard work and gardening. She enjoyed sharing a cup of tea, and lively discussions of literature, travel, and current events, with her “Union College Boys,” several of whom later honored her with a special citation at Union graduation ceremonies in 1994.
In life and in death, Ethel Avery, mother to none, was a mentor, friend and source of inspiration to countless young people – those she came to know at the library and college in her adopted hometown, and those she would never know, at the small college in Kansas that inspired her own intellectual journeys.
Bethany College, established by Swedish Lutheran immigrants in 1881, is a college of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The mission of Bethany College is to nurture and challenge individuals in their search for truth and meaning as they live lives of faith, learning and service. Bethany College is on the Web at www.bethanylb.edu
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