Recent estate gifts are providing long-term support to the University of Nebraska. Virginia A. Blackman bequeathed $900,000 to the University of Nebraska Foundation for the Professor James S. and Virginia A. Blackman Memorial Fund, a permanent endowment she established years earlier in memory of her husband.

The gift will be split in three parts, providing unrestricted support to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's College of Engineering, Hixson Lied College of Performing Arts and the University Libraries System. Her husband James received a degree from the University of Nebraska in 1931. Virginia also received a degree from the University of Nebraska in 1931.

Another estate gift helps students attend the University of Nebraska at Kearney. The Amos and Doris Greenamyre estate created an endowed scholarship fund totaling about $1.5 million. One of the largest estate gifts in UNK history, the fund will generate about $70,000 a year.

The Greenamyres owned farmland southeast of Kearney and in Hamilton County. Doris was a 1938 graduate ofwhat was then known as the Nebraska State Teachers College at Kearney. Amos also attended the University of Nebraska.

"Scholarship support is what makes a university education attainable for many of todays students," said UNK Chancellor Doug Kristensen. "Gifts like this help worthy students overcome economic challenges."