Greg Bachman gave Ruth Gilman a unique gift for her 101st birthday last Friday.
Bachman stopped in at Gilman’s house to tell her that a scholarship is being established in her name at Emporia State University. The scholarship will be endowed by Emporia Physical Therapy and Fitness.
“We just decided we’d start a scholarship in her name for an ESU student who’s going into physical therapy,” Bachman said. “This is just something our business is going to do.”
Gilman chuckled when she recalled hearing about the scholarship.
“I think that’s marvelous. I was so shocked I didn’t know how to react.,” she said. “... If I hadn’t lived to 101 years old, I wouldn’t have gotten in on it”
Bachman, who has known Gilman for many years, wanted to find a way to honor her and her accomplishments, both professionally and personally.
“I’m always going to remember her,” Bachman said. “It’s important for me that people remember people like her in the community.”
Gilman spent much of her professional life as a nurse at Newman Memorial County Hospital, now Newman Regional Health, and in private nursing.
She worked with Cora Miller, a physical therapist who also was the first nursing supervisor at Newman. Later, Gilman took over the physical therapy department for a brief time, while still maintaining her job in the X-ray department of the hospital.
In her spare time, she has been deeply involved in volunteer work and helping friends who need assistance.
The scholarship in her name will be awarded each spring to a fourth-year student preparing to make a career in physical therapy.
“They will have to have applied to a physical therapy program,” Bachman said.
A successful applicant also will have to meet criteria that will be established; one of those criteria definitely will be the student’s record of volunteer work.
“We want to make sure that whoever gets it is someone who’s doing that,” he said.
The first scholarship will be awarded in the spring semester of 2007.
“I’m very pleased to think that this will go on and on and be of encouragement to a young person,” Gilman said.